There's Hole in the Sky (English translation)
by KH2083
Summary: In an accident, the group of mutant from Genosha is transported to the futuristic world. How will they find a way home and at the same time stop the next invasion on our planet?
1. Chapter 1

**There's hole in the sky...**

World: Marvel

Time: After Reload

Main characters: Magneto and the Excalibur from Genosha.

**Chapter 1: Kidnapping**

Erik Lehnsher was standing on destroyed residence's terrace looking at the landscape stretching out around him: the hills of barren and burnt soil and ruins of huge skyscrapers devoid of their former magnificence growing out of the red sand. He was watching destroyed Hammer Bay, capital city of Genosha, the state which he had ruled in the past and which was supposed to be a promised land for every mutant. When he as Magneto had forced the UN to give him the power over the island a few years ago, he had believed that his dream had finally come true. He had built the sanctuary in which people similar to him could find home free from prejudice and persecution. At first it seemed that everything was going in a good direction. Many mutants from the entire world arrived to Genosha to settle down and the state grew in strength, becoming the object of jealousy of other nations. Unfortunately that delusion, as every ephemeral dream, didn't last long. One day huge battle machines sent by crazy Cassandra Nova appeared in Hammer Bay and other cities of the island and started the massacre of their inhabitants. Community of millions was reduced to only a few survivors in the sequence of a few hours and beautiful cities crumbled like houses of cards. The dream of the man died once again. The wind was waving Erik's hair and in the man's eyes tears appeared. Magneto lost in the contemplation didn't notice when his oldest friend and the enemy Charles Xavier, bald man on a wheelchair appeared next to him.

"Here you are again, my friend?" He asked him.

"I am examining smoking remains of my dream, Charles..."

"Don't forget that what happened here was the same defeat for me as for you. I'm wondering if our roads hadn't branched many years ago, we would have been able to prevent the tragedy of all these people." Magneto turned away from the friend and not saying a single word tightened hands on the fence of the balcony. Xavier noticed that scraps of metal on the entire terrace started vibrating and emitting a metallic sound.

"Your pointless daydream about our peaceful coexistence with the ordinary men led to this tragedy. If we had been harder, if we had imposed our will upon the entire world, children whose ashes are blown by the wind from above the ocean would have still played in the green gardens of Hammer Bay. If we had united in order to oppose intolerance and hate many years ago..." Xavier noticed that Magnus' eyes started glowing in blue color. He knew that he had to calm him down or he would become a threat to everyone who survived on Genosha.

"Erik, calm down. You know that your way of hate never worked. Perhaps if you hadn't attack the Cape Citadel so many years ago, people wouldn't have been so afraid of us today".

Lensherr clenched fists and a blue glow appeared around his body. He leaned against the fence feeling weak. The professor came telepathically into his mind in order to calm him down.

"We must leave our whole past behind us. We will build the Genosha's future together. We will create the hope for better life for our survivors. We must rebuild the state for them and for the ones who passed away." Glow around Lehsherr paled and his eyes started looking humanly. The man was very tired out. Xavier was alarmed by his state but he didn't show it.

"Erik, this attack has been repeating itself for a long time. Should you not be examined? Perhaps Henry McCoy should see...?"

"Am I supposed to come back to America? After what this madman impersonating me did there? Everyone is waiting to seat me on the electric chair there! Your X-Men especially!"

"I meant the McCoy who lives here with us..."

"Do you trust him Charles? I didn't think..."

"Certainly I don't trust him. But we must take on every aid which is offered us."

A woman with black hair and a patch on one eye appeared on the terrace. She was dressed in the leather jacket and her hands reminded green tentacles.

"I didn't want to stop male talks Charles, but we have a problem on the streets. Kids are rebelling. Food rations are ending and the situation is becoming tenser".

"Thanks Callisto. I'll talk to them." Xavier replied. He directed his wheelchair at the downward slope from the terrace. He turned to Magneto.

"Erik, do you wish to come with us?"

"Not now. I prefer my own company now. They will hear you out; some of them still cannot stand my face." Professor and Callisto left the terrace.

"You gained such a reputation dear friend." The bald man thought. Magnus felt worse once again. He gripped the fence more firmly. A light blue glow surrounded his body, much more intense than the last time.

The professor and Callisto who was accompanying him appeared on the square in front of the destroyed residence. The square was little in size and its pavement was cracked. The dry fountain was standing in the vicinity and a lot of wooden boxes were scattered everywhere around. All mutants who survived the massacre on the island gathered there. Wicked - the black-haired girl dressed in gothic black clothes was sitting on one of the boxes. The boy with blonde hair, who because of his abilities of shape change was called Freakshow was standing next to her. The bald black man – Shola Inkosi was standing near the entry to the building and young black mutant girl called Hub who recently joined the Xavier group was sitting on the destroyed fountain. Karima Shepandar called Omega Sentinel – a woman being the hybrid of the flesh and the modern technology came up to the professor.

"Professor, morale of our charges has dropped very low. We must solve the problem of food as soon as possible."

"Please understand us, we're hungry, we're sleeping in incredibly bad conditions. We're worn out with such a life." Shola said.

"McCoy said that he knew where some warehouses with a food were. Hub, did you check the location which he mentioned?" Xavier turned to the black girl.

"I'd like to do it. But I haven't seen this shaggy monkey for two days. He didn't say anything about the location of the warehouses. " The girl answered.

"He treated us lightly and moved into some comfortable place." She added.

"Or something killed him on the way." Wicked completed the sentence.

"To tell the truth, we wanted to talk about something else, professor... We don't know if we manage to live in this place any longer and you after all..." Freakshow tried to change the subject.

"I'll tell straight from the shoulder! We're starving here, we're slowly dying here and at the same time, on the second end of the world, kids similar to us live in a luxury and safety in your school! Perhaps it's high time you called your X-Men to take us away from here?" The black-haired girl announced nervously.

"Wicked. You should understand that rebuilding your own homeland is more important! You should have a desire to rebuild your own home..."

"My home? There isn't my home anymore! My parents and friends of mine are all dead!" The girl replied with tears in her eyes.

"Nothing is holding us here, professor" The blonde man announced.

"You are right. You can choose your own future. However there are other reasons..."

"Charles, do you want to rebuild Genosha for these kids or perhaps for him?" Callisto joined the conversation.

"Callisto, I didn't expect such a reaction..." said bald man.

"It's why the X-Men won't come for us; the professor doesn't want them to learn that he's together with him." Hub said quietly to her friends.

Meanwhile Magneto started collecting more and more energy around his body. There was so much of it that it created a blue glow shining intensively around the man. Erik's face was sweaty; it was apparent that he was not controlling what was happening to him. Metal objects were raised by an unseen force and they were whirling around the mutant. The man being like in a trance jumped out of the fence. He fell on the square where young mutants gathered. More and more metallic scraps circulated around him.

"Wicked, look out!" Freakshow pointed at Magnus.

"Magneto!"

"Erik! What are you doing?" Xavier shouted.

The large piece of metal pipe flew in the direction of Hub with a huge speed. Girl instinctively teleported herself to a safe place and metal squeezed into the destroyed fountain. The large metal sheet was falling on Wicked. Freakshow morphed into four-arm wild beast and using superhuman strength and speed rescued the girl from the terrible death.

"Erik! Calm down!" Xavier tried to talk sense into his friend. He used his telepathy to enter his mind and calm him from inside, but unfortunately in a vain.

"Charles! Try to put him to sleep!" Callisto shouted.

"I already tried! I'm not able to enter his head! He's in some kind of trance; he most probably doesn't know what is happening to him!" A large piece of metal grate headed in the direction of the professor. Callisto caught the man with her tentacles; she threw him down from the wheelchair and fell down with him to the ground. The structure hit Xavier's wheelchair destroying it completely.

"I will try to calm him down." Karima replied and rose into the air.

"No!" Charles wanted to stop her sensing some kind of danger. Energy discharges coming from Magneto struck the girl, burning her electronic systems. Unconscious woman fell to the ground. Shola using his telekinesis tried to protect everybody from metal remains flying everywhere. Eric stopped on the pavement. His energy started accumulating until it created a hole in the fabric of the space and time, real wormhole. The mutant was drawn inside it. Karima met the same fate. The hole started widening, sucking everyone one by one: Wicked, Freakshow, Shola and Hub. The professor was looking at everything with a terror in his gaze. Callisto ran in the direction of the hole.

"What are you doing?" Terrified Xavier asked her.

"I cannot leave kids with this psycho. Don't be afraid, Charles. I'll get them back." Callisto jumped in the wormhole.

"Callisto." The hole closed after disappearance of the woman. Metal shreds remaining in the air fell down with a big thud. Xavier was completely alone. It was hard for him to believe in what he witnessed a moment ago.


	2. Chapter 2

**Chapter 2: Down the rabbit hole**

Electrical discharges in ionized air were lightening a black night sky covered with heavy clouds which concealed a vast, futuristic metropolis. Extremely high buildings stretched out from the space plunged in the darkness which probably hid their foundations many meters below. Their numerous lightings replaced stars which stopped being visible from this place a long time ago. Bridges, along which modern trains were driving, were built between some buildings and lights of flying air ships were flashing here and there all the time. A huge building, with respect to which even the largest skyscrapers seemed little, towered over the entire city. It was even blacker than the sky surrounding it, there was no lights on its surface but it was enveloped by a faint purple glow. Huge terraces covered by gardens were located on one of the residential towers of the city on which trees were being whipped by the wind and leaves taken from them were dancing on a stone pavement crossing through gardens. Space around one of terraces whirled, a blue glow appeared and a corridor identical to the one which captured Magneto and his charges opened. The man emerged out of the shining hole still emanating with an energy. After a moment his companions also left the space-time corridor. Erik floated a few meters higher, pulling unconscious Karima with himself. His power burnt itself out, the mutant lost consciousness and fell on one of terraces. The girl hit the hard pavement nearby him. She was paralyzed by damaged parts of her mechanical body, because too long travel close to Magneto caused that her diagnostic system was not able to cope with such an extensive damage. The remaining part of the group touched down on the terrace located two floors below. The rift in the reality closed up after expelling the last member of the group. Hub instinctively teleported herself and landed on a soft grass near the big tree, Freakshow turned into big, orange monstrosity and caught Wicked trying to absorb the energy of the girl's fall. Black-haired girl seemed not to be in contact with the reality as something turned her mind off. Callisto thrown from the tunnel clutched the edge of the terrace by her tentacles at the last moment but stones and pieces of mud and grass, which she hit, fell down hundreds of levels below. Shola generated a telekinetic bubble which crushed rocks lying on the route of his fall. He managed to touch down quite softly. The noise caused by the group woke inhabitants of the tower up. Wicked squatted on the ground and hidden her head inside hands. The boy standing by her changed back to the human form. He noticed that the girl was terribly pale and convulsions were shaking her body. He touched her shoulder. It was ice-cold.

"What' with you?"

"They're gone!"

"Who?"

"They're gone!" The blonde boy moved face of the girl in the direction of his own. He could see great fear in her eyes.

"Who is gone? What happened to you?" Wicked started screaming. The boy wanted to calm her, but he wasn't able to do it. He kept her firmly so she didn't break free. Callisto looked all around.

"Where the hell are we?" She could see stunned Hub rising from the ground, Shola and farther Freakshow and Wicked. She didn't know where the rest of her group was.

"Magneto?" Shola asked coming up to the woman.

"I don't know, perhaps he didn't survive the passage through this whirlpool. There is no sign of Karima". Hub not saying any words pointed at the terrace above where blue lighting was twinkling.

"Magneto."

"I can see Hub, now we must pull ourselves together and learn what is happening here". Glass door leading to the terrace opened and a few persons emerged from it: a black-haired man armed with strange looking rifle, white-haired woman with blue eyes and pointed ears and a little girl very similar to her. Callisto looked at the sky seeing red lights realizing that something was coming, probably trouble. Vehicles resembling motorbikes loomed the darkness of the night. Men were sitting on them. They were dressed in grey military uniform decorated with blue lines going from the collar to the leather belt. One of them took some type of weapon out.

"These are most probably rebels!" The man standing in the doorway to the garden shouted.

"In that case they must die on the spot". Entirely bald soldier answered. Callisto knew that she didn't have a chance to talk some sense into them.

"We must act" She announced.

"Am I supposed to attack them?" Shola asked.

"No, we don't know what we're dealing with. And apart from that we're weakened very much".

The woman came up to Hub. She laid tentacles on her shoulders.

"Listen, you must teleport us all. There…" She pointed at the gaping gulf behind fence of the terrace. "But I don't know how high we are… I can end up in a rock, or in some building! Then we'll die!" "We'll be moving in steps. In the end you'll see the ground and when it happens, you'll seat us down safely."

"But what will happen, when I can't? We'll smash ourselves!" Callisto became nervous.

"Listen to me! You're our only hope now. If you teleport us, perhaps we'll die. If we stay here, we'll certainly die! You must risk!" Black girl agreed. Shola brought Freakshow and Wicked close to her, but black-haired girl didn't recover from the shock yet. Men on strange scooters were closer and closer, they were circling around group of mutants. A strongly built man in gray uniform, with long white hair, blue eyes and pointed ears appeared above them. His cape was blowing in the breeze as he levitated nearby his subordinates. Hub pointed at the balcony above.

"And what's with them? What's with Magneto?"

"We'll come back for them later. We'll find them and rescue them if they are still alive". Callisto replied not believing in what she was saying. Hub's used her abilities and teleported the team beyond the reach of their opponents. Surprised soldiers seated their machines on the terrace. Long-haired commander came to the owner of the garden. The man was clearly upset seeing him on his grounds.

"It is an honor that you visited us, we didn't expect that we would be rescued by..." The soldier hushed him up with one move of the hand.

"Are you sure that these were rebels? They clearly had the power at their disposal..."

"They appeared out of thin air, general!"

"General! There are two more of them, they're both unconscious!" The commander smiled and flew up two floors above, then he fell on the terrace where Eric and Karima were lying. One of uniformed people examined them with some type of the scanner.

"Interesting... this older man is radiating very strange energy. He can be dangerous. However his companion... is merging of a woman with a machine! Where could the technology of this type come from?"

"Take her to the Science Center… but this man must be placed in our guest lodgings" White-haired male announced and flown away disappearing on the night sky.

"It'll be done General Kanzar!" His warriors replied.

After a few jumps Hub managed to teleport the entire team to the very bottom of the city. Great darkness prevailed there because huge buildings towering above it covered entire light out, in the day as well as in the night. An abandoned city was located there. Buildings would be considered as very high in normal circumstances, but in this place they faded under the enormousness of their more modern equivalents from above. They were in ruins, there were no panes in many windows and their walls were decorated by graffiti in various languages. As far as eye could see there were no artificial lights, probably the electricity stopped being delivered to this part of the city a long time ago. Burning barrels betraying the presence of the local population were standing here and there. Wrecks of cars were rusting along streets and a lot of rubbish and scraps were visible everywhere around. In the radius of a few closest side streets one could see no living human being. The team was too confused to examine the place in which they found themselves. Hub fainted right after finishing the teleportation. She didn't fall down on the street only thanks to Shola's reflex. Wicked walked away a few steps, she vomited and then also lost consciousness. Callisto looked at two boys.

"They may need a medical assistance. I'll look around here. Stay with them!"

"Won't be better if somebody of us goes too?" The black man asked.

"No. You're much more powerful than me. If there's some trouble you'll defend girls. Apart from that I'm accustomed to such areas." The woman smiled. She took the knife out from behind the belt and walked away disappearing in the darkness. Freakshow and Shola put their friends on the pavement so that they felt comfortable and then they sat down as close as possible to them.

"Listen. There's something wrong with Wicked... something very wrong." The blonde man announced.

"Maybe she just tolerates the teleportation poorly. She'll be okay soon."

"No, it's something else. She screamed like somebody skinned her..."

"Where the hell are we?" The blonde boy covered his face by hands.

"We don't even know whether that's all is real... perhaps it's someone's trick? Magneto is with us here. He won't let a single mutant die again. If it's necessary, he'll destroy this city to find and rescue us. " black boy said.

"He may be dead already." Freakshow finished his sentence. He got up and walked away of few strides. The situation seemed to outgrow him. The black man came up to him, still keeping his eyes on unconscious girls.

"Listen, what's your name?"

"You know."

"I'm not asking about that name. What is your given name?"

"We used our real names, pseudonyms in Genosha."

"And don't you have other one?"

"I have... Micheal..."

"It's okay, I felt stupid calling you Freakshow." The bald black man patted the friend on the shoulder.

Callisto was walking along the street passing by wrecks of cars standing here and there. From their state she could judge, that they hadn't been used for many years. She looked at the big building towering opposite the intersection of the road on which she stopped. The big door with the smashed pane proved that it had been a shopping centre at one time. The woman realized that burnt-out neon lights had been formed in the shape of Japanese letters.

"We're in some big metropolis in Japan." She thought.

"…or at least in its equivalent in this world."

In the vicinity of the entry to the supermarket much more barrels stood. A fire was burning in some of them and therefore mutant girl thought that they could be an indication of the fact that some people are stranded in the building. She crossed the door cautiously and walking near to the wall she slowly accessed deep into construction. The inside was entirely plundered; all products which had been there at one time were sold or stolen a long time ago. The woman stood up on the corridor with doors to different shops and looked toward the ceiling in order to check whether somebody wasn't lurking on the top floors of the building. Something moved. Callisto quickly turned to the side from which strange sounds were coming. There were a few persons hidden in the opposite part of the shop, three men and one woman. Men were wearing green-grey clothes looking like worn out uniforms. One of them had a beard; the remaining ones had faces smoothly shaven off and short hair. The woman was attired in green cape; she had long, curly, brown hair. Men were holding rifles and the girl was armed in a weapon resembling the spear.

"Who's there?" Bearded man asked.

"I don't have a clue. I've never seen her." The woman replied.

"Look at these tentacles of her, this is something horrible."

"She's next victim of the Institute of Science most probably, they dropped her off when she failed them."

"No... it's impossible. They're frightened. They hide or escape, like chased animals."

"This one here isn't a victim... she is rather a hunter."

"The way she's moving, exploring the area. She's searching for somebody."

"She looks like on a hunt." The woman summed up.

"Is she the next trick of the ones from above? To find us and get Natalie?"

"Prepare weapons, we're coming." Brown haired girl signaled to the rest of the group.

Callisto sensed the motion of people. She heard their quiet conversation, a clang mixed with faster heartbeats and breaths coming from a distance. She knew that she could not risk, these people were a unique chance for her and she had to try to talk with them, but only when they were disarmed. She dodged behind bookshelves on which products were presented long time ago.

"She revealed herself!" A woman shouted. Her companions lined up and opened fire. Bullets chopped bookshelves up, destroying completely remaining shelves. After a brief lapse three men tried to check what happened with their target. The leader of the group stopped two of them, the bearded man and the blonde.

"Only one will go. There's no need for risk. Aaron."

"Of course." The man replied. He went behind the bookshelf cautiously. He was happy seeing furniture pierced by bullets but was really surprised when he didn't find the corpse of Callisto next to it. In the same moment mutant woman leaped from the nearby shop. She was unusually fast, much faster than the soldier was able to imagine. She kicked him in the belly and seized his weapon throwing it far away. She hit him so strong that he lost consciousness. The bearded man aimed at her, he wanted to pull the trigger. Callisto quickly took the knife out of the pocket in a trouser's leg and threw it with all her might. The knife flew close the head of bearded man causing him confusion. Mutant woman quickly ran along broken escalator up the next level of the shop. The other man tried to aim at her but she was too fast for him. Series of bullets fired by him hit stairs and the balustrade on the second floor. Two warriors ran up the stairs looking carefully for Callisto but she was nowhere to be seen. Men were frightened, unsure of next step, sweaty, they were breathing unevenly. Callisto emerged from behind a large plastic figure portraying some fox, central figure of the Japanese computer game for children. She had tentacles spread out and she was holding knives in every one of them. She threw them at the people attacking her. They fell down to the ground immediately, blades flew above their heads. Callisto intentionally threw knives to slow them down, but not to hurt them. Woman commanding the group seemed to notice it, because she stopped on the stairs for a moment. She was gazing at the entire event with eyes opened wide. One-eyed mutant ran into the unlocked door, she clearly wanted people chasing her to do exactly the same. One of them ran after her. He found himself in a huge room with rows of chairs and torn, huge screen, the cinema had to be there a long time ago. There was darker inside it then in other parts of the building. The blonde man could see nothing. He gripped his rifle nervously. Callisto was feeling great in such conditions; she spent her entire life in sewers. She emerged from behind the back of the boy and smiled widely. She entangled him with her tentacles and kicked him firmly. Bearded man, hearing the shout of his friend, ran into a screening room. He saw the unconscious blonde man. He started firing the rifle blindly, being sweaty and panting.

"Where are you whore! Show yourself!" He used all his ammo. He threw the rifle down and took the knife out. Callisto decided to talk to him.

"Listen. I don't wish trouble. I want only a help."

"A help? In that case what are you doing here at the bottom?"

"I'm not from here. I know nothing about this place. I need help for my companions. They're wounded."

"I know how I help you, you whore! I'll eviscerate you!" The bearded man shouted and tried to stab her with a knife. Mutant caught him by her tentacles.

"I wanted simply to talk." She announced looking at his eyes. She hit his body against the wall with all her might so the man fell down on the floor inertly. Callisto came out to the main corridor. Her last opponent, long haired woman was waiting there for her.

"I hope that I'll be able to talk some sense into you."

"You defeated my people. I cannot risk." Stranger girl announced and immediately took the cape off. She had brown dress tightly adjoining to her skin. She was neat and athletic. She attacked mutant woman with the spear. Callisto barely dodged it; she didn't expect that her opponent would be so fast. She hit the edge of the wall and her adversary immediately used it against her. She threw the spear again but this time Callisto squatted. The weapon butted the wall. Using the moment of confusion mutant kicked her foe powerfully. The girl fell on her back.

"I don't know how I came here! I don't know what is happening here! I only wish to find help for my friends!"

"People like you don't have a friends! You'll lead me into a trap!" Long-haired girl replied and knocked Callisto over. The woman quickly got up. She hit the mutant woman with the spear, then she did it the second time. Blood of one-eyed mutant fell on the floor, she became furious, caught the arms of the girl using her tentacles and threw her against the wall.

"If I was really the person you think I am, you wouldn't be alive, both you and your people. You could see how I was fighting! All these knives are lying all around here but they could be in your hearts."

"Maybe I can believe you..." The woman whispered. Callisto grabbed the spear out from her hands.

"I'm called Rose. Rose Gardner."

"I'm Callisto." Mutant announced. But I'm not going to forget it." She pointed at the nose and hit the woman so strongly that she fell on her belly. She threw girl's weapon far away and squatted close to her. Rose tried to recover from the punch; she was holding her sore face, blood was flowing across her lips and her jaw was hurting her very much. One-eyed woman smiled widely.

"Now we'll talk to each other." She announced helping the young woman to get up.

Erik Lehsherr regained consciousness. He slowly opened his eyes and looked around himself. He was in a little, round room in which there was no furniture apart from white comfortable bed and a small table, there were no windows or doors also. Globule of white light which was some kind of lamp was hanging above the head of the man. Magnus sat down on the bed and then clenched his fists. He tried to use his abilities on walls of the room in order to get out of his prison. Something blocked his powers or maybe the creation of wormhole and the trip through it weakened him. How could he produce a wormhole? He never had that kind of ability. It required something more than control over the electromagnetic field. And what if he wasn't its creator? Perhaps somebody used the phenomenon to send him to the other reality and remove him from the Earth forever? Erik stopped thinking about such matters. He thought that his important task was to get out of that place, learn what had happened with remaining mutants, protect them and lead them home if it was possible. The man got up. He started strolling around the room looking for its weak points. An oval door appeared in the wall. A young girl went into the room. She had white hair, a pale complexion and pointed ears, she was holding something in hands.

"Fresh clothes for you." She announced.

"Who are you? What is this place?" Magneto asked.

"It's the palace of the Lord Kanzar. I'm one of his servants."

"Can I go outside?"

"No. Direct order of Lord Kanzar."

"In that case am I a prisoner?" Magnus' eyes glowed with blue color.

"No, you are a guest of the Lord Kanzar. The lord will meet with you as soon as he is ready".

The girl vacated the room leaving Erik alone. The man examined clothes lying on a bed. It was grey uniform, similar to the one which General Kanzar wore. Erik had to act the way people ordered him. He was going to examine all their weak and strong points. He realized that they could be the only hope for finding young mutants in this world completely alien to them.

Callisto approached her younger companions together with the woman against whom she had won the duel a few minutes ago. She noticed that Hub regained her consciousness and was sitting on the peak of big scraps of concrete. Shola was standing in the vicinity and Mike was by still unconscious Wicked's side.

"It's Rose... one of locals... she agreed to help us." The bald black man quickly ran up to women. "What is this place? Where are we?" He asked.

"Relax." Callisto calmed him. Rose approached lying Wicked. She squatted close by her, raised her head gently. She listened to her breathing; she examined her pulse with a touch.

"She looks extremely depleted. I can say nothing more right now. If I had the access to the medical equipment..."

"In this place?" Callisto was surprised.

"There are generators in the underground station where we live. We have a little hospital there, besides we managed to steal devices of the Highest..." Rose lowered her head.

"There are no healers between us." The girl saying these words became sad.

"I'll take on every aid which you can offer us." Callisto said.

"I'm not from here and I completely don't know in which direction I'm supposed to go." She added. "Where are you from? Are you from the Kingdom of the North America or from the Great Empire of Egypt?" Rose asked.

"Or maybe from... the Ocean City?"

"These names mean nothing for me... I know that perhaps it'll be hard for you to believe… most probably you won't believe me, but I'm not from this Earth..." Mutant girl announced. Long-haired woman became nervous. Seeing this Shola geared up for the fight and Freakshow rested his hands on Wicked's hair. Rose calmed down, she sighted.

"Your ears... eyes... you aren't from the same place as they..."

"They? Who are you talking about? What is this city hovering above this place? Was it Japan here a long time ago? What happened in this world?"

"It's very long story. I'll lead you to our camp. You'll rest and somebody will certainly answer every your question. And how did you get here?"

"It's very long story. Did you perhaps hear something about parallel Universes?"

"There were such theories... I don't know whether even the Highest were able to prove them."

"Perhaps I'm a traveler from one of them," Callisto smiled. Suddenly someone's shouts broke the silence - inhuman screams like somebody's was skinned alive. They came from ruins of the supermarket in which still unconscious Rose's soldiers stayed. Some shape came up to the group. Bearded man who earlier fought with Callisto was quickly approaching the group. He was dead scared, white out of fear.

"Guards! Guards are approaching! They killed Rudolf and Aaron! They murdered them!"

"Damn it! It must be already after zero hour! Or they changed patrol customs again!" Rose paled. "Who are they?" One-eyed woman asked.

"Death." Brown haired girl answered with a gruff voice.

"We must escape and hide somewhere!" Soldiers dressed in grey uniforms mounting flying scooters turned up in the darkness. Hands of one of them were on fire with strange energy.

"They came here after us." Callisto whispered reminding herself inhuman screams from past minutes. "Shola, Freakshow, can you fight?" She asked.

"Yes."

"I think so." Both boys replied.

"Shola, do you see the one with strange hands, He can be dangerous."

"I'm on it Callisto!" The black man raised both hands above his head and then a huge wall of telekinetic energy was shot in the direction of approaching enemy. It hit the man with hands being on fire crushing his scooter. The wreck together with its driver fell on the pavement exploding with a bright flame.

"The anointeds?" One of soldiers shouted surprised. He was entirely bald man. The other man with long bright hair shrugged hearing these words.

"Guerrillas grabbed some weapon of our Saviours! The hell with them! I'll show you who they really are right away!" He took the object looking like some kind of weapon out. He didn't manage to use it, because Shola's second energy wave hit him. He fell on the pavement exactly like his companion earlier. Bald man seeing the whole situation turned his scooter back, he turned its accelerators on.

"This one is escaping. He'll come back here with the reinforcements, probably with the Highest!" Rose replied becoming worried.

"No!" Mike announced. He changed into large, yellow creature. He raised long, sharpened bar lying close by and threw it with all his might at the escaping guard. He damaged the engine of his motor. The bald man lost control over the machine and hit one of the ruined buildings. The bearded man and Rose seeing action of strangers didn't know how to behave.

"You all have the gift! You all have the gift!" The bearded man screamed.

"You must come to the camp as soon as possible. Marcus must absolutely see you."

Meanwhile in a parallel reality Charles Xavier was sitting on the terrace of the destroyed residence in the Genosha. He had closed eyes and his face expression showed immense effort. He was using his telepathic abilities in order to find Magneto and mutants accompanying him. He widened the scope of his search more and more - the most immediate surroundings, the entire city, the entire island, the entire continent, unfortunately he was without success, because even his extraordinary abilities weren't able to break into the other world in which his friend was. Fat woman with blonde hair in glasses was standing by Xavier. She was holding a cup of coffee in the hand. When professor finished next stage of his search, she served him drink smiling.

"Thank you, Mildred."

"There's no need. I'm here to help you. If I could be useful for you..."

"But you are doing a lot."

"Any progress?"

"Unfortunately not. He's nowhere in the range of thousands kilometers. They probably aren't on this planet anymore."

"You mean they're dead?"

"If they died accessing the wormhole, I would sense it. Instead of that, their awareness simply disappeared... they can be in the other end of galaxy or ten centuries in the past."

"It's starting to outgrow me. I'm only a simple librarian." The woman announced coming up to the end of the terrace.

"Don't you think that you should... inform the X-Men?" Xavier fell into a pensive mood.

"I can't involve them in this matter... there are certain cases..."

"Magneto." Fat woman interrupted him.

"You're right."

Fat lady looked at the sky. She noticed the black shape. Blackbird plane was approaching the Genosha Island very quickly. Surprised Xavier remembered that he had arranged the meeting with representatives of X-Corporation. They were supposed to take and examine prisoners who had attacked Xavier and his people a few weeks ago and maybe were also responsible for the assault on the X-Corps building. The black plane landed vertically near the residence. Charles turned in the direction of the obese woman.

"Mildred, we must greet them."

"Of course."

"And remember: We cannot tell them about what happened here or about Magneto."

"I understand. But this girl? Is she not a...?"

"Yes. Monet is a telepath, but she isn't able to break my barriers as well as barriers over minds of our prisoners and your mind is immune to telepathy which I was able to experience myself..." Xavier expected his guests in the courtyard. Two persons got off the plane: Monet, dark-skinned girl with long hair and dark-skinned man Thunderbird.

"Welcome Monet, Neal." The professor said. His former pupils said hello to him and then they started to look around surroundings.

"Indeed, terrible hole." Monet announced.

"How could somebody did something such horrible?" Neal said with a sad voice.

"We will try to rebuild what was destroyed and take care so that it never repeats itself again. This is Mildred also called Book. She's helping me".

"You aren't rebuilding the nation with one person only, where are the others?" Monet asked.

"They're... on rescue missions in various parts of Genosha. They won't come back here sooner than in two days."

"We'll have to get to know them some other time." Neal said. The professor tried to change the subject.

"Neal, what's with Lifeguard?"

"She's seriously injured, but fortunately she's feeling much better."

"Good to hear. Some progress in the investigation?" Monet corrected hair.

"We hope that your guests will help us. At the moment we found only a body of one of these trolls. Someone probably hired them in order to attack both you and our registered office. Did you learn their reasons?"

"Unfortunately not. Two of them, who commanded the trolls, claim that they're ordinary robbers who wanted to earn well on Genosha's properties".

"I would like to see them."

"Of course, Book will lead you to them." After these words Charles walked away from two mutants. Monet was surprised by strange behavior of the professor; she gave him a curious look. The bald man turned away and moved farther.

"I have a lot of matters on the head." He disappeared in the corridor of his residence.

Prison cells were located in basements of the former police station. They were very dark, they stank of the old age and the mustiness and unpleasant chill ruled in their interior. Monet was standing opposite one of the prisoners and the young woman was looking at her from behind the bars. She was slim; she had piercing in a few places of the body and tattooed dragon was seen on her shoulders. She was gazing at the mutant with disrespect being very self-confident.

"Do you intend to cooperate with me?" Monet said quietly. Appraiser smiled widely. She came up closer to bars in order to see the face of Monet more precisely.

"No, I'll vanish from here soon, I and my partner".

"That's correct, we're taking you to the X-Corporation registered office. You both will talk there. But I can spare you unpleasant experiences." Monet announced. The girl burst out laughing. Monet clenched fists, but young mutant didn't stop laughing. Long-haired felt like tearing grating out and knocking all teeth out of the prisoner's face, she refrained herself with an effort.

"You don't understand that I already performed my task? They'll take me from here soon? You don't understand because you know about nothing!" Appraiser was laughing very loudly.

"What task! What were you supposed to do!

"Better ask the professor about it because he isn't telling you the whole truth. Ask him about who disappeared a few hours ago and who lived with him here ".

"At the moment I'm interested only in what your participation in the attack on the building of our organization was."

"You won't believe me, if I tell you that it was only a dodge in order to approach the former master of this island?"

"Magneto? He is dead." Monet replied angrily. She lost her self-confidence.

"Ask Xavier".

"I won't be wasting time on you any longer. Prepare for journey". The young woman left basements. She was angry at herself, that she had let herself be provoked by the girl. She didn't want to believe in her words, but she felt that there was something true in them. She ran up to the boy who was standing behind the entry to the police station with the fat woman. She touched his hand.

"Go to the blackbird for chains, we're taking them."

In the same moment three strange figures turned up at basements. All their bodies were covered by plate armors. Helmets on their heads looked like bowls turned upside down. Their armors were richly ornamented by winding patterns, they differed only in a color, one of them had red, the second one blue, and the third one green armor. The red stranger touched a button on his glove and grating in cells dissolved into thin air. Pleased Appraiser ran out between armored men.

"You kept your word!"

Stripmine, her long-haired companion emerged from the second cell. Trolls tried to escape from their room. The green warrior lifted his glove and monsters dissolved into thin air. Three strange individuals in the company of freed prisoners left basements and geared up for the escape. The fat woman barred their way.

"Do not move! These are prisoners!" The group wasn't upset with her presence. Mildred took the weapon out, she remembered how Xavier had taught her how to use it. She didn't want this knowledge to be useful for her. She aimed at one of men, closed her eyes and started shooting. Bullets reflected from his armor. Neal and Monet appeared immediately. At the sight of the black girl Appraiser started laughing again. Thunderbird launched two streams of solar plasma toward the red knight. Their heat was easily absorbed by the armor. M rose into the air and attacked the opponent but blue knight stopped her with one move of the hand. The punched girl was thrown away a few meters and hit the ruin of the building standing close by. Neal quickly came up to her and tried to help her. The group and escaped prisoners teleported into the unknown. Book came up to the X-Corporation mutants pushing the wheelchair with Xavier because professor wanted to be by his pupils as soon as possible. Neal was standing nearby Monet. He was helping the girl to get up. When he touched her torso she groaned with pain and cringed. She looked at the boy through tears.

"Damn... they probably broke my ribs..." Neal withdrew his hand. He could not believe something like that was possible, taking into consideration the increased resistance and the endurance of the girl. Mutant woman leaned against the wall of the building, she felt exhausted. Xavier was very close to her.

"Who were they?" He asked.

"Enter my mind and check". Monet muttered through her teeth. She kept her balance with an effort, she wasn't accustomed to pain and especially to such an intense feeling. Charles Xavier closed his eyes and performed reading out of the girl's memories from a few last minutes.

"We must start searching them." M replied pointing in the direction of the airplane.

"First things first, you must go to the hospital, Monet." The professor announced quietly.

"It can be beginning of a large scale attack on us." Black girl didn't want to listen to her superior. She tried to be strong, come back to the work and begin the search immediately. She passed few steps breathing with difficulty and then stopped.

"Neal, accompany me to the blackbird." She asked unwillingly. Thunderbird came up to her and at that very moment he heard in his head Xavier's telepathic voice.

"Take her to the nearest X-Corporation registered office. Let them take care of her. She is seriously injured. I'm taking the matter of apprehension of fugitives and the ones who helped them into my hands."

"I'll do as you say, but I don't think that Monet would give up so easily". The pair of young mutants came back to the deck of the airplane. The girl lay down on the armchair at the back of the cockpit. She closed her eyes. Neal was worried about her health, he sat down by her and felt like calling Xavier. She stopped him.

"I'll survive. And I'm not going to give up, they pay for what they did to me." Thunderbird moved away from the girl.

"You're thinking so loudly that I can hear you even in spite of this damn pain". Monet announced. Neal smiled and prepared the machine to take-off.

Xavier and Book watched the departure of the blackbird. The woman covered her face from the dust which starting airplane threw away from the ground. She was looking at the sad face of the professor whose thoughts were miles away.

"You sent them not exactly because you were worried about the girl".

"That's correct. I'm sure that two of our prisoners and the ones who helped them are somehow connected with Erik's disappearing. Therefore we must find them".

"I understand that we have to do before this X-Corporation does it?"

"Yes."

"How are you going to make it, alone?" Xavier fell into a pensive mood. He scratched his chin.

"No. Of course, no. And I think that I know the perfect people who will help me to find Magneto".  
Bald man smiled. He asked Mildred to lead him to his private room. He had to rest, because he had difficult task ahead of him.


	3. Chapter 3

**Chapter 3: The Brand New World I**

Callisto's group and their new acquaintances travelled across streets of the ghost town covered by the total darkness. They were not talking to each other, not wanting to risk the attack by the next group of soldiers. If one patrol turned up earlier, the others could come also and therefore the team had to listen closely to quietest noises of approaching opponents. Callisto and Rose were walking at the front of the group, Hub was in the middle of the formation and Freakshow was carrying sleeping Wicked, all the time being in the form of the orange creature. Shola and bearded subordinate of Rose were at the tail of the procession. Everyone approached the entry to the underground station. It was crammed with the plenty of wooden boxes and wrecks of cars, steel barrels stood here and there. Brown haired woman showed where to find a path. All group members, one after the other, went through the fissure among the junk, because it was the only possibility to get to the maze leading to the interior of the closed station. In order to fit in the narrow passage, Freakshow had to change his shape to human form and then he, together with the bald black man, carried unconscious Wicked trying to walk cautiously enough not to harm the weak girl. After the short crossing, they were on stairs leading to undergrounds also littered with various junk. The bearded man took the torchlight from behind his belt. He had to use it, because there was not even a starlight or fire from barrels in basements which could brighten up the darkness even a little bit. The group turned towards railways of the broken underground train and then they headed in the depth of the tunnel. Their walk didn't last long, because two armed men emerged from behind the wall formed of sandbags. They aimed the weapons at the incoming people, their faces expressed the readiness to use them. Rose raised her spear, giving the guards known signal. Men smiled, recognizing familiar girl. They wanted to say something to her, but they noticed faces of other people which were completely alien to them. They directed the weapons at the group again.

"Calm down, they're with me." Rose replied calmly.

"They saved our life from the patrol of the Highest. They have the gift!" The bearded man announced very enthusiastically. The woman hushed him up with a move of the hand.

"They're travellers from a distance. They need our help. This girl particularly." She pointed at Wicked. "She's ill". She added.

"All right, go." The first man replied.

"What happened to Rudolf and Aaron?" The second guard asked.

"The patrol found them as first. They weren't as lucky as we." The woman answered him sadly. Guards lowered heads giving sign of understanding. When the group found itself on the other side of barricades of sandbags, Rose turned to soldiers again.

"Be particularly careful. We don't know why the patrol was there at such strange time".

Callisto and the rest of the team walked away into the tunnel. It was necessary to go very slowly, since the torch of the bearded man was the only source of the light there. Water was dripping from the ceiling, strange sounds which probably originated from rats living in subways like lords in their own kingdom, were heard.

"Why didn't you tell them the truth?" Callisto asked.

"I said. You saved our life".

"You didn't say the whole truth. You know what I mean. The fact that I fought with you earlier."

"I could not. They would never trust you, besides they could blame you for the death of my companions".

"I understand. Freakshow, what's with Wicked?" Callisto asked turning at the direction of the boy. "She's sleeping. But her breath is rhytmic and she isn't so cold anymore. Probably she's slowly regaining consciousness."

"I want to sleep also." Hub announced.

"When will we reach some civilization?"

"Behind the next bend". The bearded man answered her.

"If we can call our camp the center of civilization." He added after a moment. They reached the next post which looked identical as previous one and was also guarded by two armed men. After the conversation very similar to the one from a dozen minutes ago, Rose pointed at the ladder leading to the surface.

"Is your camp upstairs?" Shola was surprised.

"Yes, do you want us to live like rats?" The bearded man was indignant.

"We live on the surface, but in the part of the city which can only be accessed by the underground. Our safety is the most important thing". Rose announced getting up on the ladder. Everyone followed her footsteps. Mike morphed into yellow, four-armed creature with a beak, he grabbed Wicked using his new two hands and two remaining ones used to clutch crosspieces of the ladder.

"Our city is surrounded with a huge wall and apart from that we're shielded with the force field created by the technology stolen from the Highest. You'll see yourselves." Rose pressed the button on her spear. "I made a small hole in the force field, without it, we woulde be fried". She replied opening the manhole leading to the surface. Everyone found themselves in the camp which Rose talked about earlier. There was much brighter than in the other parts of ruins of the city, a light could be seen in buildings' windows, street lamps were also operating. Obviously, the camp had its own generator of the electric energy. People gathered on numerous alleys, many of them were armed, bunch of children were running here and there. One-storey buildings stood on both sides of the biggest street, but there was not a single skyscraper. The darkness of the metropolis raising above the city wasn't so overwhelming, the camp had to be built on its outskirts. The big building was located in the central part of the small town and behind it two more constructions stood: one looking like a hospital or some scientific centre and the second one which were surrounded by many people dressed in uniforms. Rose directed the group at the building with glazed walls, probably some shop. She asked Callisto to enter there with her. When women were inside, brown haired girl took the green cape from the stand.

"Cover yourself with it, when we're walking through the city. I don't want you to arouse the sensation."

"Of course. I wish no trouble now." Mutant woman replied and covered herself with the green fabric. She stopped after leaving the shop.

"Should we not pay for it?" She asked Rose.

"We don't have something like money here."

"But this place looked like a shop..." Callisto was surprised.

"Perhaps, but you don't have to pay for anything, because everything is shared with everyone. Everyone can take from storerooms what he or she needs and give it back later, when it's no longer needed. Such a system turned out ot be right in our community."

"Don't you have a problem with dissapearing of things? With thieves?"

"In our reality we aren't giving any importance to the material property, since we have the higher purpose. Our common enemy which caused that we had united".

"I lived in the similar society, but we were outcasts".

"We're also, in the eyes of the ones who rule the Earth now."

Rose left the building and Callisto followed her. Her companions were waiting for her outside. Mutant woman noticed that Wicked and Freakshow were not present as well as bearded friend of Rose.

"Locals took Wicked to the hospital. Mike went with her". Shola informed her.

"And we?" The woman asked Rose a question.

"I think, that it's high time you rest. I'll show you our guest lodgings."

Michael awaited inside one of buildings in a narrow corridor. Dirty walls, lighted only with a small spherical lamp hanging from the ceiling, surrounded him. A front door was opened slightly and sounds were coming from the outside: someone's conversation, distant laughter of children, some metallic buzzing, probably from the metropolis above the camp. The boy was looking at the closed wooden door with a concern and after a few minutes, the man emerged from it. He was slim and had grey hair, he was wearing white lab coat and he was holding strange device in his hand. Mike turned to him as soon as he noticed him.

"What's with her?"

"I don't know. Really. The scanner is showing that she is completely healthy, perhaps a bit exhausted, but healthy."

"In that case why she didn't wake up?"

"She probably fell into some kind of the psychological shock. The chemistry of her brain is slightly disturbed, like after a very intense, traumatic experience".

"Can I visit her?"

"Please yourself... but now you won't talk with her. You can stay by her as long as you wish."

Doctor left the corridor. Freakshow entered the room in which unconscious Wicked was lying. Semi-darkness prevailed there, sounds from the outside were almost entirely muffled by walls. The girl lay on the big bed covered with the white bedding and her black, gleaming hair were spilt on the pillow. She was sleeping calmly, her breath was even. The boy touched her forehead with his hand. It was warm, physical effects of what had happened to her was probably slowly passing. Micheal had been looking at the pretty face of his friend for a moment. He decided to look for the rest of the group and decided that he would visit Wicked later, when the girl regain her consciousness.

Erik Lehnsher was waiting in a silence for the appearance of mysterious Kanzar about whom the young girl with pointed ears informed him earlier. He was dressed in the uniform which the housemaid prepared for him and he was trying to use his abilities to learn something more about the place in which he was imprisoned. Unfortunately, he wasn't able to penetrate through the barrier built of a strange substance, not responding to blows of the electromagnetic field which his body emitted. The door appeared in the wall of the room, as silently as the last time and the person already familiar to the man appeared in it.

"Lord Kanzar will accept you on the audience. He expects you in his study". She said lowering the head.

"It's about time ". Magneto replied. The girl pointed at the oval room asking Erik to go with her. After the departure from his cell, Magnus saw the long corridor, with walls, floor and ceiling made of white material. A few spherical lamps rising above heads of everyone who walked along the passage, caused that everything around had seemed to radiate the light, annoyed eyes like bright fresh snow at the noon. Erik was walking very slowly listening intently to his own steps and the sound of feet of the person keeping him company who was quiet and didn't return attempts to establish any contact. The girl stopped at the second end of the corridor and the door opened in the wall right next to her hand. The man tried to reuse his abilities again in order to learn something more about the place in which he was. This time he achieved a little success, because he managed to sense that walls of the corridor were thinner than the ones of the oval room and air was probably present behind them. Erik and the girl were in the next, much smaller room. Feeling of acceleration caused, that Magneto guessed that he had been in the lift rushing to the meeting with higher floors of the metropolis.

"I know that they didn't let you talk to me..." Erik tried to make a contact with his companion. The girl looked at him with large eyes.

"Tell me your name". He asked.

"Ciel..."

"Ciel... Tell me where are we?" Erik asked.

"You'll learn everything from Lord Kanzar soon."

Ciel answered quickly turning her head away from the man. She was frightened, as if the conversation was something forbidden for her. Magnus decided to watch the girl and get to know what role he played with Lord Kanzar about whom she was talking all the time. The lift doors opened again. The corridor located behind it was different than the previous one, less bright and wider, additionally it had windows. Two men, dressed in the same grey uniforms as Magneto wore, stood at the second end of the corridor. Erik looked out of the window noticing clouds and lights of the building standing below. The man realized the largeness of the metropolis, whose residential towers were so huge that their top floors were raised above the layer of clouds. His thoughts were disrupted by young Ciel, Erik was asked to pass through the door guarded by soldiers. The room which he entered was huge. All its walls were made of glass or some other transparent material and one could see two towers of the city lighted with hundreds of tiny bright dots behind it. Some of them were stationary, other were moving between buildings like insects flying around their own hive. A semi-darkness preveiled inside the room, there was only one spot of light at the center of the room where the large desk was placed. The man sitting by it ordered Ciel to bring Magneto to him with a gesture of the hand. As it turned out, the mysterious man was Kanzar, long-haired leader of soldiers from the city. When Erik came closer to the desk, the second chair with the golden backrest materialised from the thin air. Kanzar without words ordered Ciel to leave the room and asked Magnus to take the place by the desk.

"Welcome traveller." He said to the man looking at his eyes. After a moment a bottle of wine and two glasses materialised on the desk. Kanzar got up from the desk and came up to the mutant.

"I am Kanzar and I am the commander of soldiers defending this beautiful and large city and all its citizens."

Erik decided to get to know what the long haired man knew about him and his younger companions who had also been drawn to the strange city. He needed to know if Kanzar had any connection to the spacetime tunnel and whether he knew what had happened to the rest of mutants.

"Your own soldiers are slipping out from your control. I'm also the citizen of this city and I was brought here by them against my will. What was my crime that I had been treated this way?"

Kanzar smiled, looked at the landspace behind the window, on which some big passenger air vehicle in the shape of bright cigar was floating, and then he returned to the conversation.

"A few hours ago one of our centres observing the space-time continuum surrounding the city and its neighborhood noticed the strange anomaly, reading that only something unusual could give, like the emission of gravitational waves or the opening of a black hole. The reconnaissance were sent near the anomaly and what they found? Strange people were there, with unusual abilities... witnesses are talking about the teleportation, telekinesis, morphing... all without the help of the technology... a moment later I made a personal appearance on the spot and what did I find there? One of the strange people, the man who is able to generate the electromagnetic field. So spare me lies that you come from this city, because it is impossible. All Chosen Ones are registered in the database and you can't be one of them. You aren't my enemy or the prisoner, I want only a few vital information." Erik was silently looking at the long-haired man.

"Where are you from and what did you do there? You aren't from the camp of outcasts, because they have nobody such powerful... apart from this little slut... let me guess... Kingdom of the North America... or the legendary Ocean City?"

"I am a traveller like you said yourself. I want only to track down my companions and find the way home."

"If that's the truth, perhaps you will describe me your home and tell me exactly where it is located?" Kanzar sat down on the armchair opposite to the grey haired mutant.

"I'm called Magneto... and I come from the place about which you didn't know anything. As a matter of fact, you won't be able to believe in the truth of my words." Erik replied.

"Really? I have a very fertile imagination. Enlighten me."

"I came here by an accident, I arrived through the strange space-time anomaly which was probably lured by my superhuman abilities. I'm not from this planet, I think I got here from the parallel world." Erik spoke with a calm voice. Kanzar was silently eyeing lightings of air ships moving behind the pane. Magneto scanned the space with pulses of the electromagnetic waves. He reached a conclusion that the room in which he was, had been most susceptible to his abilities. He was sure that he could free himself from it with an ease. Kanzar came up to the bottle with the wine, he filled both glasses up with the alcoholic beverage and then he smiled widely.

"In that case you only confirmed discoveries of our Institute of the Science. Welcome in the paradise, traveller" He announced raising the glass. Surprised Erik moved back, and then he returned to the conversation.

"Are you responsible for getting me here?" The eyes of the man glowed blue.

"No... but your appearance can be an announcement of a big changes for both of our worlds."

"I won't let manipulate myself, neither I won't be intimidated. Remember about it." Magneto said firmly.

"I am not your enemy"

"Then why I was a prisoner in the room without windows which effectively blocked my powers?"

"I had to make sure who you really were. For the sake of this beautiful city. We aren't sure whether there are the Chosen Ones who still try to oppose our purpose and the great happiness which came across this world. Even one such a person could disturb the perfect harmony of this place, cause illness of our shared organism."

"Your words mean nothing to me".

"Be patient... you will soon learn everything about this place and then you will become a part of our community and the first herald of widening the light of our love to other worlds which are still plunged into chaos and anarchy."

"I don't understand what you mean." Erik wasn't satisfied with enigmatic statements of the man. Kanzar went to the window, he looked at the air vehicle floating nearby.

"We must come off to the trip around our metropolis. You will hear the history of the birth of this place, which became the legend passed from mouth to mouth between all worlds".

"I don't know what is happening with my companions". Magnus didn't want the continuation of the conversation, he knew that the man had been hiding something, but he could not confront him.

"My people are looking for them now. We can guess where they are and what kind of dangers can meet them, but we still aren't sure about it. We will find them. This place is one large organism with hundreds of connections. Messages are spreading here unusually quickly, if anybody meets with strangers, we will be informed. Can we start our journey, traveller?"

"Yes." Magneto replied. In the same moment, walls of the room parted as if they were made from sheets of paper and little airship, looking like silver platform with richly ornamented balustrade appeared between them. Erik noticed that the vehicle hadn't had the driver or the visible engine, most clearly it was raised by Kanzar's will power. Long-haired man was poweful telekinetic and Erik knew that moving walls of the study aside and steering the big scrap of metal was the show of strength which he performed for him as a sign of warning.

A night reigned over the camp in which rebels lived. In spite of the late time, life in that neighborhood was in progress with its own rhythm, people were walking along roads of the small town in the direction of the square placed in the front of big building which, judging by the amount of people in uniforms guarding it, held something important in its interior. Burning torches stood in many places, which caused the entire neighbourhood gained the magical appearance, contrasting with dreary walls of buildings renovated long time ago and torn clothes of people living there. Callisto, Shola and Hub as well as Freakshow who joined them after the visit in his wounded friend's room were led by Rose to the housing estate for civil citizens of the town. The place wasn't too impressive, it looked like slums in which the poorest people and the social pathology lived. Houses standing there were small, broken, built out of cheap materials like wooden plates of different kind, garage metal sheets, or even large scraps of cardboard. People looked out from their insides gazing with the great interest at strangers strolling around their own teritory. Men, women and children, all of them looking the same, poor, dirty and with sad facial expressions. Children playing in courtyards of old houses stopped their games in order to look at foreigners hoping that some of them will bring them gift precious only in this surroundings. Rose pointed at the white house standing right behind a crossroads and she notified mutants that they will be able to rest and refresh themselves before their next meeting there. The interior of the house was clean and pretty, in spite of many years without repair, it constituted an oasis of peace amongst oceans of dirt, metal sheet and torn up clothes. As soon as Rose crossed gates of the building, the old woman in the long, blue dress came up to her. Her grey hair was tied into a bun and she had glasses as thick as bottoms of bottles on her face.

"Welcome Rose, you don't even imagine how I am pleased that you are safe and sound!" The older woman said embracing her younger familiar.

"Hello Mary. I brought along new people. They're fugitives from the city above us, they went through a lot, so don't torment them with questions but instead show them where they'll be able to rest and consume something warm." The grandma came up to mutants carefully watching them. She looked at their clothes which seemed strange to her, she felt like looking under the fabric covering Callisto's tentacles. Rose stopped her curiosity reminding her why she brought her new acquaintances.

"Of course, I am simply interested." The fat woman felt embarrassed.

"Please, come with me." She added smiling widely. The four of mutants followed the courteous woman toward rooms placed more deeply inside the house. Rose stopped Callisto.

"I'm going to meet with our leader. I'll tell him what you said to me before. Prepare for meeting with him." He told to her quietly so that elderly lady couldn't hear her.

"Ok. Don't forget about the fact that two people from my team are still missing". The one-eyed mutant replied.

Wicked woke up in the room completely alien to her. There was a darkness in it, only a weak light of a lamp standing somewhere in the distance was flowing through blinds of the window. The girl was attentively looking at the furniture and other objects emerging from the darkness with shapes which seemed to be strange and unrealistic because of girl's perception disturbed by the shock which she had experienced a few hours earlier, the medicine given her and the lack of the light in her bedroom. Wicked was horrified, she felt faint and she knew that she wouldn't be able to defend herself, if any danger met her. Impulsively, she tried to sit down on the bed pointing her head in the direction of the only source of light behind the window. She could hear someone's distant conversation, laughters, sound of the saw or some other tool. She felt that a cold sweat was penetrating her and the feeling of fear she had experienced going through the space-time tunnel started returning. An awareness of huge loss, the emptiness and the solitude formed in her thoughts. She knew that she would have to pull herself together, she couldn't panic, but she wasn't able to control herself, rivulets of tears started coming from her eyes. Wicked remembered, that since her mutational abilities had become apparent, she was never alone. Apparitions have always kept her company, they were ghosts, strange energy which assumed the shape of ephemeral human silhouettes inhabiting her body. Wicked didn't know whom they had been, she had not a clue whether they had been real ghosts of dead persons or only a manifestation of her abilities, but thanks to them she could always count on someone's company. When she was alone, she could hear their whispers in her head like the noise of the radio station tuned to some non existing broadcast. Unfortunately, passage through the Einstein-Rosen tunnel caused that these beings were torn out from her body in the unusually brutal way and they stayed in her native world while she found her way to a parallel reality. Loss of the contact with ghosts was a terrible experience for her and her organism experienced the shock which she could not shake off. The girl could not bear terrible silence in her head, she felt like inside the echoless chamber, she could hear beating of her own heart and moving of fibres in sheets on which she lay. She thought that she had lost some part of herself, became incomplete, like somebody had stolen the piece of her soul. Feeling of the loneliness was overwhelming, because black haired girl knew that her state was irreversible. Suddenly some strange, flickering, blue flame which became more and more intense appeared nearby her bed. It quickly changed its form into something very familiar for young mutant. After a few seconds, the spectre materialised into human, transparent figure, identical as phantoms which the girl had in her body in her every day life in Genosha. The ghost pointed its etheric hand in the direction of mutant's arm, stopping at her shoulder. Wicked looked at it, she immediately felt better and the contact with the unusual being reminded her of what she had lost.

"Do you want to join me?" She asked with a faint voice. Soon, other blue apparitions turned up in the room, all of them had different sizes and different appearances. All were lured by Wicked, attracted to her as moths are attracted to the lonely lamp post standing in the darkness of the night. The girl noticed many sylphlike figures around her, wanting to connect with her body, running for shelter inside her soul.

"Everyone want to join me? I don't know whether I can..." The black-haired girl announced sitting on the bed. Apparitions started swinging around themselves, rotating around their own axis of symmetry and orbitting around girl's head. The mutant felt the injection of the energy filling her body, she thought that she could do everything. She stood on the bed spreading her arms out.

"I can!" She shouted gladly. Ghosts, one after the other, disappeared inside the mutant girl's body. She felt pain associated with every contact, but she tried not to lose her balance, not to fall down. Ghosts connected with black-haired woman's body and mind. The entire operation didn't take more than a few minutes. The interior of the room became dark and gloomy again and Wicked sat down on the bed. After the moment of the rest she needed to calm down her breath, the girl swept her hair aside from the head.

"I'm in one piece again." She said to herself smiling.

Magneto and Kanzar stood on flying platform which was moved by the will power of the long-haired man and the breathtaking view spread out around them. Two towers with tens of windows and lights raised above heads of men, below them one could see other buildings connected with convoluted web of sky-high motorways on which gleaming vehicles looking like modern cars with streamlined shape were driving. Kanzar turned to Magneto.

"We will reach our destination right away." He informed the mutant showing him the big, glazed dome under which the flora green was placed.

"My world was a place of the incessant war." Long-haired man started his story.

"The entire planet was divided in a lot of states fighting each other. Strange abilities which our people gained from completely unknown origins, caused that coflicts intensified and they were much more bloody. Our world would plunge into the fire, if he didn't appear!" Kanzar stopped looking at the purple glow surrounding the entire city.

"Who?" Erik asked.

"Our Saviour! One day, he turned up in the sky during one of our greatest battles in all history and he stopped two attacking armies. He was wearing the most beautiful white suit, his black hair was blowing in the breeze and his youthful face smiled to everyone of us. He was a pure love, he was something which could not be born on our planet, the excellent, almighty Being From Beyond. His every word, his every moved caused that our planet revived anew after years of wars destroying her. Our planet became the paradise for everyone who agreed that our stranger from Beyond became their only guide. Everyone, who opened their mind to him, were given knowledge thanks to which they could transform their planet tired with wars into the most wonderful utopia in the universe."

Kanzar stopped telling his story, because he had to put his air lorry away and together with Erik he found his way into the one of the biggest gardens in the metropolis. The park hidden beneath the dome of transparent glass was the house for tens of green, diverse trees and bushes. Many humanoids were walking on the alleys made out of a bright stone, some of them were similiar to the long-haired soldier with pointed ears and other beings were members of alien races, which Magneto wasn't able to recognize.

"When our planet was cleaned of all enemies, our benefactor told us the very essential truth about the entire multiuniverse - the row of parallel worlds lying one on another on the never-ending cosmic ladder of the creation. He portrayed us the evil and the violence which ruled in these worlds and obliged to accomplish the holiest of missions - the uniting of every parallel Earth and freeing them from all evil. Our journey through multiwersum began." Erik listened to the story of long-haired man simultaneously examining beings which walked amongst the exotic flora of gardens. He looked at the people with different skin colour, green Skrulls and blue Kree which he recognised, but also other figures like short, grey humanoids with big, dark eyes known on Earth under the name of Zeta Reticuli and green, scaled reptiloids.

"Our interdimensional alliance grew in strength with every new Earth freed during our holy war and people who opened their mind before our saviour, joining the colective counting billions of beings. What you can see before yourself is a fruit of our effort."

"Did everyone agree to entrust their fate to the stranger from other world?" Erik asked.

"No... it is impossible that every person on every Earth agrees on something what they don't understand."

"And what happened to the ones who opposed you?"

"They lost and they were thrown away beyond boundaries of our wonderful paradise and left to themselves in their dying world, while we went higher on the multiversal ladder."

Magneto looked mysteriously at Kanzar.

"There weren't too many of them, they constituted no problem for us."

"What do you mean staying in dying world?"

"Don't ask about what you still aren't able to understand. When you open your mind before our master, all your doubts will be dispelled."

"In this world, did you come across the opposition?" Erik asked farther.

"Yes, to tell you the truth this world isn't fully converted from the evil way and there are still many dangerous criminals in it. People who rejected our dream, live in their sewers, hiding themselves as rats and feeding on our wastes. Only two exits exist for them: accept our love or disappear forever." Magnus fell into a pensive mood looking at two women in long dresses with golden masks on faces who went close by.

"There is still the third possibility." he announced after a moment.

"Yes?"

"They can get back what at one time belonged to them."

Callisto was restlessly waiting for the meeting with the leader of rebels living in the destroyed part of the city. The room in which she stayed didn't resemble the rest of the camp, it was clean and undamaged. Rose disappeared behind the door leading to the study of the leader a few minutes ago, Callisto became more and more impatient. She looked at two men holding rifles and they noticed her eyes, feeling insecure in the company of somebody not known to them and what's more, somebody who arrived from the city from above, from which only trouble and the death came earlier. The woman was scared, she didn't like that she had to leave her younger friends behind in place dangerous to them. Her waiting was finally ended and the door watched over by soldiers opened with the unpleasant crack. Rose appeared in it.

"Come Callisto, it's time." She said to the mutant. When the woman crossed the threshold of the room, she saw the bearded man dressed in green shirt and spotted trousers. At first, the stillness prevailed between three persons, since everyone were examining each other, forming the plan of the conversation and all questions which they wanted to ask. Rose broke the silence turning to the bearded man.

"She's Callisto who arrived from other, parallel world. And he's John, our leader."

"Welcome Callisto..." The man said trying to shake hands with woman. When he saw that green tentacles were sticking out from under her cape, he moved the hand back and jumped away from her. He quickly shook the stupefaction off.

"I'm sorry... the sight of alien is bringing me unpleasant memories."

"In my world people reacted the same to me... even when I didn't have tentacles." Callisto replied smiling.

"Can you leave us alone?" John asked Rose, who was standing by the door.

"Of course." Brown haired woman replied leaving the room. The bearded man sat down by the desk asking the mutant to do exactly the same on the old bench standing by the wall.

"First of all I would like to personally thank you that you and your companions rescued my two people. Every single loss is severe for us." The man started the conversation.

"We're taught to act in a flash in such situations." The woman replied.

"Is everything what Rose said the truth? You really come from parallel reality?"

"Yes... but Rose told me that you didn't believe in the existence of parallel worlds."

"It's only a propaganda. One isn't allowed to mention such things, because it will lower the morale of my rebels. Feeling the enormousness of the enemy's power could be fatal for them. Did you come from the world in which there is Devil From Beyond?"

"I don't have a clue whom you're talking about."

"In that case you don't even know how lucky you are. You must be from the world which lies on the Ladder below our own Earth..."

"What are you talking about?" Callisto found the John's statement very interesting.

"I'll tell everything what you want to know... but not now. We're preparing for celebrations important for us... I must be at the bonfire in a minute... my people will be waiting for me. Tell me, did some strange phenomena appear up in your world? Meteorite which gave extraordinary abilities to people? Are you one of its chosen ones?"

"I don't know what you're talking about again. I was born with my abilities... there's a lot of people similar to me, but I didn't hear about somebody who got the power from some meteorite."

"It's good ... really good... this means that we still have a lot of time. He isn't gearing up for another jump." The bearded man was irritated.

"Listen, I want to ask you for the help in finding my companions."

"I'll try to advise something, but after celebrations. I must appear amongst my people." The man got up with the intention of the departure from the room.

"Can I join you? Me and my companions?"

"Of course. Everyone in our camp is invited."

"Thank you. I think that a moment of peace will be useful to us."

"Same as to the entire world." John answered looking straight ahead sadly.

Mary, Freakshow, Shola and Hub were walking along the avenue of the campsite lightening their route up with torches. Many people kept them company, but none of them approached them to a distance sufficient for starting conversations. Tired eyes of men, women and children looked distrustfully at faces of the ones who turned up in their small town a few hours before.

"Where are we going?" Shola asked.

"To Natalie's birthday. You're new, so perhaps you know nothing about her, or the government of the city above us told you incredible bad things about her. But the whole truth can only be learnt here.

"You will join our community, if John agrees." The woman replied smiling.

"Who is Natalie?" Hub asked.

"You will learn everything at the bonfire. Be patient young lady." Mary announced.

"I'm worried about Wicked." Freakshow said looking at Shola.

"As soon as we're on the square, you'll be able to visit her." The black man consoled the friend.

"Let us hope that she already regained consciousness." He added. The trio of mutants approached the square, where many people gathered. Burning torches stuck into the ground stood everywhere and sounds of loud conversations were coming from the crowd. Hub looked around being worried. Her gaze came across anxious eyes and dislikes for her and her friends.

"What do they want from us?" She asked the fat woman.

"Be calm. Messages are spreading quickly in our community. They already know that you are fugitives from the city. They are anxious because some of them experienced a lot of evil from the Highest and their chosen ones hands. Don't worry, if you prove to us, that you want to become one of us, they accept you." Mary said touching the girl's shoulder.

"Thank you." Black girl replied.

Magneto and Kanzar were watching lively city from one of the largest observation decks. Men were not talking to each other, because long-haired man fell into the strange trance, reflection. Erik used the moment of the peace to try his abilities out, to feel the contact with metals forming everything which surrounded him. He realised that his powers had already become as strong as before the trip across the transdimensional tunnel . Kanzar broke free from the stream of thoughts.

"My people discovered where your companions were travelling."

"Yes, it's a good news. Where are they?"

"Unfortunately, they fell into hands of wild people living outside the city, the ones who rejected our paradise. I can't be certain if they are still alive."

Erik clenched fists and his eyes started glowing with blue light. The energy danced around his body coming to atoms of metals in the most immediate surroundings. He used his abilities on the balustrade separating the terrace from the chasm behind it. The long pipe with round cross section started oscillating, moving like living being, then broke free from fence supporting it and flew towards men like the snake slithering on the non-existent surface. Erik caught the metal object and converted it into the spear.

"If something happened to them, all guilties will pay a terrible price for it." He said looking at Kanzar.

"Certainly, it will happen." The long-haired man replied.

She was terribly worn out and she wanted only to return home and get into the bed. It was already third duty and she had slept only for four hours. If she won't rest quickly, hallucinations will begin, she thought. They taught her this in the med school. She wanted to get dressed as soon as possible and leave so that nobody met her, she didn't feel like having a conversation. What was worse, her head ached her terribly. The ginger woman went along the corridor leading to the underground garage in which she parked her car. She thought about how she would like to work in some better hospital, rather than in that godforsaken hole where nothing interesting happened and money, which were being paid her, was ridiculously small. However, it could not come true, not to her, not after what she did, not after she had to change her name and past. Unfortunately for her the past was supposed to catch up with her that awful night. The woman stopped since she noticed that in the shadow of the concrete structure somebody concealed had lurked. Impulsively, she headed in the direction of the lighting in the hope of being able to notice some detail of the mysterious assailant. In the range of the lamplight, the bald man on a wheelchair appeared with the fat woman in glasses behind him. Charles Xavier looked at the ginger woman and his face expressed big concentration and seriousness.

"What do you want! I'm not interfering in your matters!" The woman tried to start the conversation.

"I need your help Amelia. I need your help to collect Acolythes and find Magneto and my people." Amelia Voght paled at the thought that Erik Lehnsherr was alive and turned up in her life to topple it over again."


	4. Chapter 4

**Chapter 4: The Brand New World II**

The flame of the bonfire lightened up the square located in the very centre of the campsite - hiding place of fugitives from the great city rising up above it. Many people gathered there, both sexes, various races and different ages, wearing green uniforms as well as dressed in everyday clothes, destroyed by passing time. Three young mutants from the Callisto group were also amongst the assembled company. They sat on wooden boxes, in the distance of a few metres from other participants of the meeting. Nobody trusted them, different stories about them wandered among the crowd. Some of them mentioned that the group had arrived from the city above the camp, they were removed from the perfect society for some gruesome crime, other believed that they had been agents who had the task of showing the position of the entry to the camp to the Highest and others thought that mutants had arrived from other continent, from legendary Ocean City or even from completely different reality. Some could hear the story that people with extraordinary abilities rescued one of their companions from the certain death and they imagined that thanks to them their standard of living would finally improve and they wouldn't have to search for food in wastes from the metropolis they hated. Hub was watching eyes full of anger of all people passing by her.

"I'm feeling here like some outcast." She announced looking at Shola. The bald black man turned around in her direction.

"It's something normal for me. Not everyone spent as much time in Genosha as you." Shola replied reminding the trouble he experienced before moving in to the island which at one time was ruled by Magneto.

"Where is Callisto? We're wasting time here but we should come back up and search Magneto and Karima. I'm fed up with sitting here and doing nothing."

"Be patient. Callisto is talking with the leader of these people now. Perhaps he'll be able to help us." "Really? You are probalby totally blind, because the locals look like they want to chase us away." The girl said angrily.

"Stop both of you, or else you'll start quarrelling!" Freakshow stopped the conversation of two black mutants.

"Don't you think we should go to Wicked?" He added.

"You're right. A few hours passed, since we've seen her." Hub said jumping down from the box.

"You don't have to move anywhere!" All three of them turned their head around hearing the familiar voice. The black-haired girl was standing opposite to the dancing flame of the torch. She was feeling much better than a few hours earlier, her face took on a new colour ceasing to be ghastly pale. The blonde man ran up to the friend.

"What are you doing! You shouldn't get up! You were barely alive! Come back to the hospital!"

"And am I supposed to miss the party? Never!"

"You were unconscious, we had no contact with you! I'm not joking!" The boy was worried about the health of the friend very much.

"Calm down, I was really ill, but I got better." The black-haired girl calmed him simultaneously sitting down on the box next to the black girl.

"And I know what knocked me down ".

"Really?" Shola asked.

"Yes, Going through this hole, I lost the entire energy which gathered in me in Genosha. Something tore all "ghosts" out from me. As it turned out, I cannot simply live without them!"

"And now they came back to you?" Hub asked interested. Wicked shook her head.

"No. But I found new friends here. This place is so terribly overfilled... with the energy of dead persons... some terrible tragedy had to happen here. Everyone... found the house in my body. I never felt better!" The girl answered gladly.

"Listen... perhaps we'll look for Callisto? She most probably got lost in the crowd." She suggested after a moment. All mutants agreed to her proposal.

Lord Kanzar went along the corridor and sound of impacts of his boots against metallic floor was reflected from white walls and the ceiling. The soldier guarding the big, glazed door obediently stepped down from his way letting him enter the room hidden behind his post. The man entered large room which looked like the modern laboratory. A huge container of transparent material filled up with green liquid stood in the central part of the room and there was a plenty of diverse machinery on tables arranged nearby it. A few men in white laboratory coats were moving around. Long-haired man approached the vat noticing that some shape was floating inside it. It was a woman with brown skin and the closer look at her face allowed to see that she was Karima Shapandar or rather what remained from her after scientists of the laboratory had taken care of her. Mechanical body parts of the girl were disassembled, her bionic hand and leg were taken away from the body and put on tables, where scientists conducted different tests on them. All weapons the girl had inside their body were removed and thoroughly examined. The woman was unconscious, she was floating inertly in a green liquid and the only clue, that she was still alive were bubbles of an air created by the respirator stuck in her mouth and nose. Kanzar turned to one of scientists.

"Do you have some results of preparatory analyses?"

"Yes, we are sure that her technology isn't similar to anything we know. They come from the branch of multiworld which we don't have access to."

"It's a wonderful message."

"What are we supposed to do with her?" The researcher asked.

"Analyse her farther. You must check, whether her weapons can help us to build the army against rebels, America or to break through barriers of the Ocean City. And most important, nothing what is happening here can get out beyond this room, it cannot reach our dear guest. Do they understand?" "Yes, general Kanzar!" The scientist replied coming back to his work.

In the world, which was designated with a number 616 in the Multiwerse, there was a moonless night and surroundings of the hospital car park were almost completely empty, not counting three people standing in the shadow of the pillar. Amelia Voght was looking at the face of the bald man on a wheelchair and obese woman in glasses who kept him a company. Voght was mad at her old acquaintance, because he had tracked her down in spite of her attempt to end her relationship with the former life and everyone whom she knew from those times unpleasant to her. She felt like escaping, using her abilities to change into the fog, but she was too tired and in addition, she knew that she wouldn't be able to break free from Xavier's telepathic grip.

"I don't want to be involved with anything concerning Magneto or other members of my former team. I haven't used my abilities since this maniac attacked New York. If you want, you can enter my head and check yourself! I have nothing to hide!"

"Amelia, calm down. Your help is necessary."

"I cannot help you! How many times I have to repeat it! I don't want to have anything with the Acolythes, Magneto and everything he represented. I know that what this madman did in the New York was terrible, but you must search everyone who cooperated with him on your own! I don't want to have anything with them!"

"Amelia..." Charles said quietly guessing the next step of ginger mutant.

"I understand that events of recent months caused that you try to forget ... who you were in the past. I know, that some victims of the attack on the New York were taken to the hospital in which you worked. Everyone who has a bit of humanity in his soul would be shaken by such an event. But you must know one thing, Magneto isn't responsible for what happened then." Voght was surprised and she felt even more irritated.

"What? What are you talking about! The entire world could see what Magneto did in the New York!" "Yes, the entire world could see Magneto, since somebody wanted to burden him with the additional crimes, the most terrible of all of them. The truth is completely different, Erik didn't attack the city. It is not Erik who died by Wolverine's hand and not his headless bodys is in the coffin in Genosha."

"Amelia calmed down and then the curiosity won with the dislike to the professor and fatigue after a hard day of work.

"How do you know about it?"

"I was in Genosha. I lived there with Erik, trying to save what was left after the extermination of the island. Mildred can confirm my version." Xavier said looking at the woman standing by him.

"In that case, who this madman from the New York was?"

"I don't have a clue. I wanted to learn it myself, but unpredictable problems met me and my partners. Now we have a far more serious problems."

"And you're coming with them to me? Why won't you turn to your X-Men?"

"They don't know that Magneto lives and he's helping me with the reconstruction of the island. I would like it to stay this way."

"Well Charles... I'll listen to what you have to say. I understand, that Magneto did disappear with people who he was supposed to look after, right? You need my help, because you think that Erik will want to collect Acolythes again?"

"I'm afraid that the situation is much graver. Do you remember that Erik had some more serious problems with his abilities at any time?" Xavier approached the woman.

"Yes, he had a problem. He always hide it, but some of us knew it very well. Essentially I'm not surprised, such an energy closed in the body of the man."

"Exactly. I won't be prolonging the unnecessary conversation and I will proceed to the bottom of the matter at once. Magneto produced a wormhole, tunnel in the spacetime and disappeared in it taking a few of my students with himself."

"And do you think that he did it on purpose? Did he escape from the island and you think that I know where he could hide himself?" Amelia asked, not entirely understanding what Xavier tried to make over to her.

"No. Right after I had lost sight of him I used telepathy to search the entire globe. I could not come across even the scrap of the thoughts belonging to Erik. I think, that Magneto was thrown to other dimension."

"What? To other dimension? And am I supposed to track him down? You should go to Fantastic Four or Avengers." Woman was disorientated more and more.

"Something unusual happened later. Strange people dressed in colourful armours appeared on the island. They freed prisoners which we held in custody on the island. A few thugs who wanted to steal from us a few weeks earlier. I'm sure that both them and their mysterious saviours had something to do with Erik's disappearing. I need your help, as well as the help of, let us name them, your more "stable" colleagues. We must seek fugitives out and force them to reveal everything they know about the kidnapping of Magneto. Can I count on your help?" After a moment of a thought Amelia decided to give the professor positive reply.

"I want to know what really happened in the New York. The world should learn the truth."

"Thank you Amelia. Now get back home, I'll get in touch with you as soon as I'm ready to move farther." Charles announced and he asked Mildred to carry him to the car.

People from the camp in destroyed part of the city gathered at the bonfire whose flames filled all the surroundings with a red glow. Everyone, military people as well as civilians were sitting on a dirty sand looking at the enterance to the building occupied by their leader, all of them were expecting something longingly. Young mutants also joined the crowd in order to spend the unusual night, which meaning they didn't know and didn't understand. Callisto found them very quickly and, satisfied with the improvement of Wicked's health, sat down between them. People sitting close by talked to themselves about something, they expressed their emotions with gestures of hands, but none of them made any step toward new persons in the campsite. The local community unwillingly took in fugitives from the place hated by them. Soon, waiting of the people ended and the bearded leader of rebels appeared in the door of the main camp's building. His sight hushed all conversations up and caused that eyes of every person became directed at him and the short girl who he led. The girl had not more than 10 years, long bright hair, the very light complexion and blue eyes. She was dressed in a plain, blue dress. Her sad look scanned faces of everyone assembled. John showed the girl the empty chair standing among the crowd and he quietly asked her to sit down on it. He smiled and started his speech.

"We gathered here in order to to celebrate hope given to us! Two years ago, when our resistance movement was almost entirely killed by invaders on our planet, when last of us hid out in the shadow of the cursed city belonging to the ones who stole us our identity, the miracle happened! The miracle in the form of this little lady who is sitting now between us." The man stopped his statement in order to show the girl with golden hair.

" Natalie showed us, that the Demon, who stole everything from us, can be defeated and there are powers in this world, which he feares. Everyone remember, moment in which the demon personally reached after the ones who resisted him and didn't want to adopt his style of living, when he wanted to erase us from the reality with his cursed hands. And then something happened that caused that we had started believing in the victory again. The demon wanted to destroy even the small child, he was such ruthless. But when he hurt Natalie with his fingers filled with the death, the most unusual thing happened! His arm was destroyed and we saw that he wasn't almighty, that it was possible to kill him! Therefore we are meeting here today to play and raise our glass in a toast to the health of our little hope! Health to Natalie!" John shouted raising the goblet with the wine above the head. Everyone screamed his last statement. The girl was ashamed by the fact that her name was articulated by so many people. She disappeared behind Mary, who sat by her.

"Today our celebrating is special! We managed to stole and adapt the airship of the Highest to suit our needs! Thanks to it we will be able to escape from this cursed place and set off west in the search of legendary Ocean City! We will settle in the place in which Natalie will be safe and she will grow up to the age in which she will be able to lead her own army against tyrants and get our planet back. Therefore let us be pleased at the thought that we will be free again!" John finished the speech, and then he came off toward the crowd. He gazed at the faces of everyone, searching the one-eyed woman who had arrived from other reality. People started walking off, they gathered in less numerous groups in which they celebrated the unusual anniversary in the way the most suitable for them. The bearded man found the person who he was interested in and decided to join her.

"As I promised, now I'll be able to answer your every question." He announced sitting down next to the woman.

"Are these your companions?" He asked looking at two boys and two girls.

"Yes, Hub, Wicked, Shola and Freakshow. They got here with me."

"I must thank you. You rescued my people." He said smiling.

"Go use the benefits of today's night!" He encouraged them getting to know more about surroundings of the campsite and people inhabiting it. Young mutants listened to his proposal and walked away deep into the celebrating crowd.

"What am I supposed to start with?" He asked looking at the black-haired mutant.

"From the very beginning. What happened in this world?"

"Unimaginable disaster. The end of the world which even the prophets experiencing the darkest visions could not predict. It all started with the fall of the meteorite, the stone from the outer space which toppled the order of the world upside down. The ordinary men who touched its fragments obtained the most unbelivable abilities. Flying, super strenght, eyesight burning everything on its path and a lot others. Soon, the sky swarmed with meta-people settling by force even the most prosaic problems and the world governments payed the most powerful supermen to work for them. The world was on the edge of the war, everyone jumped to each other throats. And then, something what looked like the announcement of the coming peace happened. One day the unusual being appeared on the sky, the man dressed in the white with black, curly hair. His radiant smile caused all fights to cease, the truce on all fronts. Everyone subconsciously knew that he hadn't been one of us, he was the Being from Beyond with great, practically endless powers. He offered us, the entire planet, to join something what was called the Cosmic Collective and that supposed to bring the forever peace. Many believed him, the considerable part of humanity remained sceptical. Unfortunately, like it is often, the minority believing blindly in good intentions of the stranger had the big support and they helped him to open the doors to other reality, the world of the Colective. Soon, thousands of colonization ships full of beings from most different worlds appeared on the Earth. Their remarkable technology let us overcome all problems. It seemed that it was the coming of the God. The truth turned out to be completely different and stranger from Beyond turned to be something exactly opposite. We learnt, that in order to join the star community we must open our minds to the Essence, to give him the insight into our most secret dreams. We must adopt his style of living, abandoning everything what we learnt through centuries and become modes in the cosmic machine ruled by him. For the first time, we managed to unite against a common enemy, although hundreds of people received his proposal with open arms. We attacked the interstellar army, closing the portal by which next ships with colonizers arrived. The price we payed was terrible. Australia was completely destroyed and nobody is venturing there today, because the disintegration of the space-time continuum is so intense there that bizarre occurrences are happening there. Every meta human who didn't betray us, died from hands of invaders. Europe moved in the defence of the old order and not a single one intact country remained in it. The Hanging Gardens - antigrav palaces of despotic ruler, whom the destroyed continent was handed over to, are hovering above ruins of the ancient capital cities. The huge spaceship in which the real ruler of both Americas lives, is standing behind the White House and Africa was given to the madman, building the futurist version of the land of Pharaohs there. The legend says, that one of meta-human rescued some European city and covered it in a dome of kilometres of sea water, and later transferred it to Siberia forming the Ocean City. The city under which we live is the worst of everything because the Being from Beyond lives in the Tower rising over it, in its real, horrifying shape. Two years ago, almost everyone were killed by his soldiers, everyone who you can see here, are the ones who survived. Touch of the Demon is fatal for every being not joined to his mind, I could see personally how my companions died and their bodies were devoured by the entropy lying in the interior of the demon. It turned out that there was only one person immune to the touch of the demon, little Natalie. I witnessed, when long fingers of the pitch-black monster touched her forehead and were smashed by the remarkable power lying dormant in the girl. His shock was so great that he never again dared to personally move against us and we could establish this camp, far from the cursed lights of the city. Our hope lies in Natalie and her resistance to the touch of the Being, although nobody is able to explain her powers.

"Your story is really fascinating. However, I'm worried about my companions." Callisto stopped the statement of the man.

"If they're lost in the city above us, the real danger can threaten them. The Highest can realize that they're not from here and start looking for the way to create the connection with your reality. They can carry out experiments on them for acquiring the pure knowledge and what's more, they can fill their minds with lies about the Cosmic Collective."

One-eyed mutant woman wanted to know his unambiguous answer. She didn't want to prolong the story of the man, because the past or the future of the world, in which she was, didn't concern her. She wanted to find her companions and find a way to her own Earth.

"Will you help me find my companions? Will you help me come back to the city?" She asked John stopping his attempt to continue the story. The bearded man fell into a pensive mood. He knew very well that he had to think every next statement over. Teleporter and telekinetic would be the greatest assest in his army as the personal bodyguards for Natalie. He realized that their help would increase the odds of the victory and the travel could be possible with minimum casualties.

"As I said earlier, the spacetime in Australia is torn apart extremely. If you have any chance to go back it is only there. If you help us I'll send the guide who takes you to this place by the most safe road." The bearded man suggested.

"Help you? In what way?" The surprised woman asked.

"As I said to my people a few minutes ago, we got the airship of the Highest which will let us get out of Tokyo's ruins and set off toward Siberia in the search of the Ocean City. Leaving our hiding place will alert all armies from the city, they will certainly send many soldiers after us. Perhaps it'll turn out that we won't be able to defend ourselves from their attack and then the life of Natalie as well as the hope for this world can be blown out like a candle's flame. If they were meta people in our rows, we could oppose the best warriors from the city, our chance of the victory would be larger. Please help us... you and your companions. Join our group and help us find the road to the Ocean City." Callisto wasn't satisfied with the reply of the man. She became nervous, she felt like ceasing asking him for anything.

"Am I supposed to expose the life of my people, fighting over the world about which I didn't know a few days ago? Am I supposed to fight for matters that doesn't concern me completely? Thanks for your story and giving me the shelter, but I think that I'll have to travel further alone." Mutant woman got up from the box trying to move away from people gathered at the bonfire. John went after her, trying to stop her before she commited something which she would regret later.

"How will you find the road home, alone?"

"I'll find the entry to the city. And there, I'll ask for the help somebody having much advanced technology at his disposal than you here. I don't care what will happen to this place, if only all my people go home safely."

"Don't you understand that asking them for the help, you can bring the extermination to your world? If you ask them to find a way of making a contact with your reality, they will lead armies of the entire Collective into it? Will you be able to stop them? Are there beings in your world, who are able to cope with its power?" Callisto didn't know what to answer. She realized, that if all John told her was true, she risked the next invasion, so powerful that perhaps even Avengers and Fantastic Four wouldn't be able to stop it.

"Please understand that your appearence here could cause that they start preparing to descend to the next reality." The bearded man added looking at the face of the woman.

"I understand what you mean and I realize the danger. But I cannot leave my friends behind. I must come back."

"I told you that you didn't have a chance to get about this city unnoticed."

I lived in the secret in the shadow of the large city many years. I will try now to check what I learnt through all that time. I can agree on your proposal only under one condition."

"Yes?"

" Shola, Freakshow, Wicked and Hub will join your people and set off for the search of the Ocean City. I'll go to the city and then I'll find Magneto and Karima. You'll show me how it is possible to get to the centre of the metropolis, how to defeat the barrier of the camp." John answered without the moment of the thought.

"OK. I'll lead you to the exit. But how will you find us, when you find your companions?"

"If I find the Magneto, there'll be no problem with it." One-eyed mutant replied smiling.

"Please yourself. Let me first introduce you to somebody." John suggested showing the buildings of the campsite in the distance.

Charles, Amelia and Mildred were in the little, one-room flat rented by the ginger mutant. There was a dark night behind the window, but it wasn't possible to notice it in the room which was flooded by a blue light of the neon light hanged above the bar. Because of the lack of architectural conveniences for wheelchairs in the building, the professor stayed in the car and only his astral projection was floating by the woman. Mildred came up to Amelia looking with a concern at her tired face.

"Where do you have the kitchen darling? I will make a tea for you." She suggested.

"The first door on the left. It's hard to miss." Voght said.

"Thank you for the tea." She added after a moment.

"Did you think who from your group would be a help to us?" Charles asked.

"Yes, the part of them will help us search Magneto, the rest, it'll be better if they don't know about us" The mutant replied coming up to the wraithlike figure of the bald man.

"Sarah, Kleinstocks, Neophyte and the ones who joined us relatively recently like Vindaloo, Ram-Ram, Barnacle and Static. We can't recruit such people as Spoor, Mellencamp or Senyaka. These are just plain psychopaths and murderers."

"I understand. And what about Unuscione? She also cooperated with Scott, when your space station was destroyed."

"Carmella is unstable, but we can try." Amelia announced looking out of the window.

"We must be careful..." She added.

"What?"

"Exodus. We cannot come across him. He's an unpredictable and extremely dangerous man."

"Yes, Amelia. You're absolutely right. I remember his attack on Genosha. I don't know, whether even my telepathy would be able to stop his psychic attack. I'm sure that I'll be able to detect such a powerful telepath, his presence make on the astral plane the disturbance like waves in elastic material".

"When will we start?" Voght asked wanting to stop the conversation about the person who she wanted to wipe out from her memory as soon as possible.

"Early in the morning. Please rest to be ready for the way forward. Book will try to reconstruct the route your old companions travelled after the fall of Genosha. Thak you Amelia, your help is very important to me." Xavier's astral projection answered the woman and then it dissolved into thin air like the morning fog. At the same moment, the fat woman in glasses went into the room. She carried two cups of hot tea, one for herself and the other one for the ginger friend of the professor. She smiled widely seeing Amelia's sad face. Acolythe took the cup meant for her. The fat woman settled on the destroyed couch covered with a green fabric. A neon light, which came into the mutant woman's flat every night, mirrored in her glasses. Voght was silent by a longer time waiting for the liquid in the mug to cool off enough that it would be possible to drink.

"How did you find me?" She asked.

"It isn't only my merit, Charles did the most to find exactly your psyche amongst hundred others."

"How did you find me in the New York, in this district?" Amelia asked again not giving up from exploring the information.

"I'm also a telepath. I'm able to get from people all the information which was written down at any time. Every words are swimming to my head like the river from the source. Your escape from Genosha didn't pass unnoticed. Somebody could see you, he turned the report over to police, other settled the false documents for you, other employed you at the hospital. It was enough, that Charles opened heads of right people for me and I led him at the right direction."

"It's horrifying. Charles is crossing borders by his actions. Is there a border which he will no longer cross, or will he be doing more and more terrible things?" Voght asked rhetorically.

"He is desperate. He will do everything to find those kids and get them to the Earth".

"Or perhaps he's simply afraid of what will happen, when there's no Magneto, the shadow cast by his light. Perhaps he's afraid that he'll have to fill up his place ".

"Hopefully no, my dear".

John led Callisto to the small house at very end of the the campsite, beneath the wall, behind which the first foundations of the metropolis built on the ruins of old Tokyo were located. The building looked abandoned, the same as other elements of the campsite, had a small door which didn't close because of crooked wood. The bearded man asked the woman to come in and he followed her, lightening darkness of the room up with the torch which he took out from behind the belt. Callisto noticed that the sheaf of the bright lighting had enlighted some figure, sitting in the hunched position on the floor. When she went up closer, it turned out that some grey old man had been there. John asked mutant woman to move away and he sat down by the mysterious man.

"Kozuma, can you hear me? Kozuma?" He said pointing the face straight at ears of the grandfather. "John?" The old man asked with a cracking voice.

"Yes, it's me. I brought the patient for you! Can you hear! The patient!" The bearded man tried to communicate with the man who seemed not to be in a contact with the reality.

"What's the problem? Who is this man?" Callisto asked looking with an anxiety, and at the same time with a curiosity, at the wrinkled face of the old man.

"Only meta who survived in our camp, weak and old so much that the Highest aren't interested in him."

"What are his abilities?"

"You'll see, now stand and don't move!" John said to the woman firmly and looked at the direction of the old man again.

"I brought the patient for you! Kozuma! This woman!" He screamed trying to make a contact with the grey man. Upset, he threw the cape covering Callisto down with one move of the hand and then the eyes of the old man saw the green tantacles of the woman. The man looked as if he gained power, an energy for action. He got up on his own off the floor, raising around himself clouds of dust and destroying tens of webs woven between walls of the room. He ran up to the mutant and touched her tentacles. He caught them very firmly, the woman didn't expect that so much power could still lie dormant in such a frail body. She felt the intense heat going after her limbs, running along the torso in the direction of the heart. She wanted to scream, to make the move or ask for help, but she couldn't. John stood by her adamant, watching unusual behavior of the elderly man.

Wicked, Shola, Freakshow and Hub walked about the square on which the festival celebrated in the honour of Natalie was performed. In spite of the John's advice to establish contact with people from the camp, they didn't manage to exchange a single one sentence with anybody, but the old Mary who had welcomed them in her house earlier. They felt alienated and lonely, they didn't even want to talk to each other. Freakshow was interested in the state of health of his black-haired friend, but she calmed him reminding him that when her body had regained the contact with the energy in the form of spectral human figures, she felt better and she didn't need his care. Shola's thoughts were with Karima, imprisoned high above his head, he was wondering whether he would see her again. Hub regretted that she had moved to Xavier's camp from the one in which she had lived after the fall of the island of mutants. She thought that she would have been much safer, if she had listened to Unus' orders and created the group which was using all available means to survive on burnt earth of Hammer Bay. But it was all meaningless. She was imprisoned in the world alien to her and she could count only and exclusively on persons who were there with her. The group of young mutants stopped, seeing a few people in frotn of themselves whose faces didn't express the most positive emotions. Before members of Callisto's team, assembly of the people from the camp appeared. The four of them stood out from the rest. Muscle man dressed in a military dress, who had the face disfigured by some accident or close encounter with the phial of the strong acid. The girl dressed in black uniform with a pale face and straight, shining hair with purple glow stood by him and next to her there was her friend with a blonde hair cut short and a long stick in the hand. The fourth person was the black man having one of arms made of metal. Shola tried to go the unpleasantly looking people around, but they barred his way, clearly looking for a conflict.

"Who let you walk here?" The blonde girl asked.

"We have the same rights as you!" Wicked answered her.

"Really? Who gave you such a law?" The ugly black man asked.

"We must not excuse ourselves to anybody!" Hub shouted leaving ahead of her companions. The bald man pushed her so that she came back to the row.

"You spent the entire childhood up there in luxury while we ate rats from gutters!" The girl with short hair said angrily.

"And now when you got bored with the living in the starlight, you chose the rebellion! You don't have the right to breathe the same air, you didn't work hard enough to have a place in our rows!" She added after picking her breath up. Shola turned to the blonde man.

"Mike, they think that we really are from this city." He told him to the ear.

"And you want them to know the whole truth about us?" The boy answered.

"Who knows what they would do then. And what when they will start shooting at us?" Frightened Hub said.

"The baptism of fire will be useful to you! We'll show you where your place is!" The black man shouted waving his prosthesis.

"What are we doing?" Wicked asked.

"We'll show them, that we aren't so weak." Shola announced looking defiantly at rebels.

"Remember. Without powers." He added quietly.

"The trouble is that we don't have any training in the fight." Wicked said smiling nervously.


	5. Chapter 5

**Chapter 5. **

Shola, Freakshow, Wicked and Hun stood side by side watching, with an anxiety, the group of very hostile looking camp's residents. Four of self-confident people, resembling someone who escaped straight from a top-security prison, could mean only trouble for the young mutants. Many other people who also didn't like strangers from the hated city above, loomed into the view from the crowd.

"There's too many of them. We cannot start the fight, or else we will be beaten." Wicked said.

"If only I could use my telekineses... I would pin all of them down. They would not want to do brawls anymore." Shola announced.

"And I would just scare them away." Freakshow added.

The young girl with a stick was closer and closer and her eyes showed that she had intended to vent all her frustration on mutants.

"Hide behind me." Shola came wanted to protect Hub and Wicked. Black-haired girl, not listening to him, got into position by him and the other boy.

"I can fight too. And I am going to wipe this mocking smile off her face."

At some point the crowd split into two parts in order to make a place for the rebel's leader, John Marcus and his new familiar with an black eyepatch. The moment of a confusion caused that some people returned to doing more important stuff than looking at the street fight. The young mutants gazed to Callisto and more specifically at the most unexpected changes which occurred in her body. The woman didn't have green tentacle but the real, human arms sticking out of the sleeveless waistcoat.

"Callisto... How?" Shola asked.

"Unimportant, I'm in one piece again thanks to our new acquaintances! You don't have to hide anymore! Did you understand? You don't have to hide who you are!" The mutant woman shouted.

Four Excalibur's members smiled to each other. At the same moment the girl with the stick lost the patience.

" Stop talking nonsense!" She said attacking the black girl. John looked at Callisto.

"Am I supposed to calm them down?" He asked.

"No... my kids need something which will move their thoughts away from the situation in which they are. Nothing will happen to them."

"My people are good fighters. They are older and certainly better adapted to survival."

"And mine are metas as you will see. You will have a sample of their powers."

John smiled and scratched his beard. The blonde took a swing with a stick, trying to hit Hub's face . The black woman teleported shocking everyone.

"You are a meta? I knew that it was a damn trick!" The girl shouted. Wicked attacked her with fists.

"I'll defeat you with my bare hands, because you really irritate me." She said falling down with her opponent to the ground. The bald giant with disfigured face rushed on Shola and the black man with steel hand attacked Freakshow. Hub appeared behind the back of the black-haired rebel. The disorientated girl violently turned around, assuming a defensive position.

"You witch, I won't let you make an idiot from me!" She shouted and intended to attack Hub, but she teleported again.

"Where are you, you coward! Come back here you bitch!" She was furious, she took the laser handgun out from behind the belt. When the black girl appeared before her, she pressed the trigger. A few rays of destructive light fired towards the girl, wounding her badly. Hub fell down to the ground.

"You're lucky, that I set the weapon to stun. Next time I'll kill you." The black-haired said squatting by the head of the black woman. At the same moment, Shola exchanged blows with the bald muscleman. The ugly man laughed looking at the opponent shorter than himself.

"And you can do nothing apart from glowing your bald pate!" He said being sure about the victory.

"If I showed you what I'm able to do, you would be a stain on the wall." Shola thought avoiding blows of the opponent. The mechanical shoulder of the black man came near to Freakshow, but the boy turned into the great muscleman with the appearance resembling Incredible Hulk. His strong shoulder stopped with an ease the prosthesis of the soldier. Black man, at first disorientated with transformation of the boy, very quickly returned to his senses and laughed mockingly.

"I've fought with much bigger than you! My real arm stuck in one of them!" He said pointing at his metal limb. Wicked and the blonde rolled around on ground trading blows with each other. Both girls were dirty from the dust and sand, black-haired mutant had a cut lip and her opponent broken nose. Girls' bodies were similarly built and they were both determined to defeat the opponent, therefore the fight went on and on, without a possibility of one of them becoming the winner.

"They aren't good." John said after a moment.

"The teleporter has a weak reflex, the metamorph has too little imagination and that girl is too proud to use her abilities in the self-defense and absolutely wants to show her superiority fighting in a close combat. The bald black man is undecided, he looks at your side every couple of minutes, as if he expects orders."

"They're still young. Have no experience." Callisto announced.

"And do you have experience?" John asked.

"I will show you. I must try my gift out." The woman said looking at her hands.

She threw herself into the fray. The black-haired girl who stood nearby Hub was the first person she attacked. She knocked the laser handgun from her hand with a huge kick. Later, she approached the black man with the metal hand. She hit his legs, effectively turning him over to the ground. She put one of daggers into the mechanism of the prosthesis, immobilizing it effectively. The girl in the leather dress reached for her handgun. She pressed the trigger angrily, simultaneously aiming at the one-eyed woman. She hit her shoulder, but this time the weapon was set to hurt the opponent. Callisto touched her bleeding shoulder. She looked at Shola and whispered through clenched teeth.

"We're finishing this spectacle! Can you hear me? We're finishing this spectacle!"

"Ok." The black man announced smiling. He stretched his hand out and the wave of telekinetic energy, the weakest one which he was able to produce, threw the bald muscleman to a distance of many meters. After a moment, Shola used his abilities to tear the weapon out from black-haired girl's hand and to smash it directly before her face. Surprised girl looked straight ahead, when remaining dust from her handgun fell on her cheeks. Shola performed the gesture in the direction of fighting women. He picked the blonde up to the height of a few meters, separating her from Wicked and then provided the hard landing for her.

"Excellent... almost as Kanzar." John said to himself.

"Enough fight!" He shouted looking at the one-eyed woman. All participants in the brawl, both residents of the camp and mutants from Excalibur started to calm down, trying to get up from the earth or to keep their bodies in the erect position. Only Hub was on the ground and cannot make any move.

"Listen carefully!" John turned to his people, both the ones who provoked the scuffle, as well as to all other being within a radius of audibility of his voice.

"Callisto and her companions arrived here from the world not enslaved by the Cosmic Collective! They have extraordinary abilities and promised us to help and protect Natalie in our travel to the Ocean City! They are supposed to be treated with respect! If anybody provokes the unnecessary fight, he or she will be dealing with me! The penalty will be severe, even throwing away from our community. If somebody is exposing the life and health of our guests, he or she is exposing the life and health of Natalie! Did you understand?" He said looking at the bald muscleman recovering from telekinetic wave.

"And the four of you... you're supposed to tidy yourselves up and to report at me!" He added.

Callisto looked at Shola.

"Help your friends, take care of Hub, because she suffered the most damage. We'll meet in John's building, where you'll learn of what I found out during my talk with him."

"Callisto, your hands... how..." The bald black man asked.

"I'll tell you everything, but later when we will meet at John's."

"What did he mean... who are we supposed to protect? What travel? Did somebody ask us?" Wicked joined in conversation. She was scratched and dirty and her messy hair looked terrible.

"I won't be talking with you. Not now. You must tidy yourselves after this unnecessary show off and you'll report where I arranged to meet with you. End of discussion!"

"I hate her." Wicked said.

Carmella Unscione was sitting on the uncomfortable chair in the driver's cab of the lorry moving through a desert-like wildernesses. The bearded driver was sitting next to her, busy with looking at the monotonous route and listening to the loud music coming from earplugs stuck in his ears. The girl had been on the run for a few months, she tried to escape many things like the police, her life in the terrorist organization and people with whom she made enemies, colorfully dressed defenders of the justice as well as from herself. She didn't sleep in the last nights, therefore the aural contact with the whirr of the engine and visual with flat looking areas looking exactly the same every kilometer caused that she had balanced on the border between the real world and the dream all the time. A head ached her and the music listened by the driver made her mad. The constant hurry and the stress as well as the awful food which she was forced to eat caused that she also had problems with her stomach. Proud woman, fanatically believing in the ideology of Magneto, the exemplary Genoshan citizen and the member of the personal guard of her president, at one time dreamt of the world's change, in which her race would be the rightful master of the planet enslaving primitive Homo Sapiens. After the fall of the mutants paradise, Carmella, having returned to America after months of the wandering, dreamt only to use the bathroom on a nearby gas station. After a few kilometers of boundlessness desert, a lonely building loomed into view. It was old and not renovated for many years, with a small motel, a bar and a gas station. The bearded driver stopped the car in the little car park. As it turned out, it was occupied, four cars stood by the building. It was very strange, taking into the consideration the distance of that place from all centers of the civilization. Brown haired woman left the car. The driver leaned out from the cab.

"Hurry up, because I don't have a time for the long rest."

Carmella didn't answer him heading towards the front door of the old motel. At the same moment the bearded man took mobile phone out. He called some number out and waited for somebody to answer on the other side of wireless connection.

"Listen. As you wanted I brought her to you! I hope that I will get money from you quickly!"

"Be patient, she is not in our hands. We will reward you when she is caught. " The voice said.

"She's sick and tired out. You'll cope with her without a problem." The bearded man finished the conversation. He was irritated, because he was afraid that the award for catching the mutant will not end in his hand. A few men were sitting inside the bar. Everyone were talking, eating and drinking. When one of them finished the phone call, he looked at the rest of them and they ceased all activities as if somebody acted on them with outside control signal.

They quickly changed in dark uniforms and armed with the modern looking weapon. The bartender also turned off the radio playing the loud music, in order to join members of the secret organization, hunting mutants dangerous to citizens of the United States.

"Carmella Unscione, involved in the organization commanded by Magneto, abilities - telekinesis manifesting in the form energy exoskeleton. Your weapon will be able to pierce it and hurt the mutant. Remember to shoot more quickly than she will manage to react." The man who earlier talked on the phone instructed his subordinates.

The girl stood in front of the washbasin with the broken mirror, looking in a disgust at the decor of the place in which she was forced to be. Dirty walls written with different vulgarisms, rusty taps and washbasins, the door of cabins impossible to close surrounded her from every side.

Carmella listened closely to sounds coming from the room, noticing that it had been loud a few minutes before but one moment later all voices suddenly ceased, including the music. It puzzled her very much, she felt intuitively that she had been lured into the trap. She still felt bad and she didn't feel like any fight. She came up to the dirty window with the crack repaired by the tape for packing packages. Her body started emanating the green light creating the transparent coating around her. Men waiting for mutant started losing their patience.

"What the hell she is doing there so long?" The one of them asked angrily. In the same moment, the sound of the breaking glass sounded in the room.

"Bloody hell! She guessed that we were waiting for her! She's trying to escape!" The bartender screamed. Agents moved towards the door of the women's toilet. When they came in, they spotted the smashed pane and the plenty of shards of glass scattering around on the floor.

"She has escaped through the window! Divide in two teams! We will surprise her from two sides!" The commander said to his group. Carmella went toward the desert as quickly as she could. The escape to an open space was the worst possible step she could do. Unfortunately the girl didn't have even a moment to think it through. The head ached her again, she felt weakness, and she knew that she wouldn't be able to effectively fight with a few opponents. She looked back spotting two groups of armed men dressed in black leaving two sides of the building. She clutched her aching belly thinking that if she manages to survive she will kill the waiter who served her the bad food. Or cook who prepared it. Or owner of the restaurant. Or every Homo sapiens not a superior who will be unlucky getting in her way. She looked back the second time, but this time the view stretching out in front of her eyes surprised her very much. A white fog, so thick that Carmella could not see neither buildings of the motel, nor agents chasing her, enveloped the area. The atmospheric phenomenon was something incredible in the dry part of the country and the entire event had a strong surrealist character, that the frightened girl had started thinking, if she was hallucinating. Perhaps she was poisoned on purpose and the poison attacked her brain and the entire nervous system? As it turned out, the fog was completely real and man chasing her were also surprised by its with appearance.

"What is happening here!" The one of them screamed.

"It's probably this witch! She generated mists and thinks that it will stop us."

"But she didn't have such abilities! Documents told something else about her!"

"Unimportant! Shoot ahead! Perhaps you will hit this bitch!"

The woman could hear every said word, every threat and the vulgarism aimed at her. She didn't know what was happening around her, but she decided to use the unusual occurrence. She surrounded her body with the energy armor, simultaneously moving in the direction of agents. In the same moment she heard someone's voice.

"Don't go there! Their weapon can hurt you or kill you."

"Who?" Carmella asked again thinking that her mind was not working correctly.

"Give us a moment..." A mysterious woman's voice repeated. The conversation of men terminated and the fog started thickening in one place, simultaneously thinning out anyplace else, as if it behaved completely inversely than the second law of thermodynamics would order it. Soon the white mist fade out almost entirely and the girl was figures of her attackers. Everyone stood froze on the spot, as their time suddenly stopped, as if their minds were controlled by some outside intelligence.

"Carmella, you're safe." The woman said materializing from the cloud of gas. Unscione recognized her old friend from the team.

"Voght! What are you doing here?" The girl asked surprised.

"I'm saving your rear end, although perhaps you deserved to be caught." The ginger woman replied.

"But how did you..." She wanted to ask, simultaneously looking at the agents deprived of the life standing in the middle of the desert as some strange sculptures.

"It is my prank. Subconscious suggestion for everyone to fall asleep standing. I don't want the unnecessary bloodshed." Other person joined conversation. Carmella noticed professor Xavier sitting on his wheelchair.

"You are with this traitor?" She rose with an anger.

"The professor needs our help. The situation is very grave." Amelia said.

"Let him not count on me!" Unscione surrounded her body with telekinetic armor. In the same moment she felt dizzy. Her armor flashed and dissolved into thin air after a moment. Amelia ran up to her, not letting her fall down to the ground.

"Are you shivering?" She asked looking at her.

"Did they hurt you?

"No... I'm ill. I was poisoned with something in some bar. Let us escape from here before Xavier attacks our heads again." Carmella said smiling.

"Charles! We must quickly take her to the hospital. She's in very bad condition." Amelia shared her observations with the professor. Her approached her looking simultaneously inside the mind of the second mutant woman.

"I calmed her, she should sleep now for some time." He said.

"Good. I'm going to teleport us to my hospital. My friends can ask much, we cannot permit them to learn whom she was in the past."

"Don't worry. I'll do something with this. Move us there as soon as possible." Xavier announced.

"Charles. And these people? Who are they? Shouldn't we learn something more about them?"

"This secret must wait for the other time. They will be sleeping 20 minutes and when they wake up, we will be far away from here."

Amelia changed her body into the gaseous form and then used her abilities on Unscione and Xavier in order to move them into the safe place, somewhere in the vicinity of the hospital, where she worked.

Callisto's group waited for the one-eyed woman in the building, the hideout of the rebels' command. Shola talked to Hub about what happened when she had been unconscious and Michael tried to talk with Wicked, although it was unusually difficult, because the irritated girl wanted only and exclusively to meet with the blonde and once and for all show her who was stronger. When Callisto turned up at the room, all mutants attacked her with avalanche of questions. Shola calmed them, so the woman could speak.

"Thank you Shola. I hope that you can be quiet for five minutes and let me complete what I have to say. I talked to John about our situation and I know that there's a chance of getting out of this place. His help will be necessary, because the place to which we will have to go is very dangerous. John asked us for help also. His people must move to other place, or else soon the campsite will swarm with soldiers from the city above us. They have a ship, thanks to which it will be possible, but they need the protection. The help only who has such abilities as you can provide. Otherwise their mission will fail and many of them, perhaps everyone will lose their life."

"But why we're supposed to help them exposing our life?" Hub asked.

"Forget about it, I don't intend to die for somebody whom I don't know!" Wicked added.

"There is no professor here, so I am leading the group. I decided that you would go with them and I won't change my decision. In a minute, each of you will meet with Marcus and you'll learn of all details."

"You didn't have the right to decide for us!" Wicked said almost screaming.

"Listen. Do you can see some other way out of this situation? You can stay here and wait for the appearance of the army which tried to kill you already twice. Perhaps you will get by, but what you will do when the food runs out? Rebels will take everything with themselves when they leave the camp. There is no other exit. You must fly with them."

The silence of the group showed that everyone quietly had agreed with arguments of the mutant woman. Hub spoke as first.

"And what with Karima and Magneto? Will we leave them behind in that city?"

"No. This is the second message I wanted to hand over to you. You will depart from the camp with rebels but I'll come back to the city. John will show me how to get there. I'll find the Magneto and Karima and I'll do everything to rescue them."

"Should you not take somebody from us?" Shola asked.

"No. The fewer strangers will walk on streets of the metropolis, the better. Apart from that I prefer to act alone hiding in the darkest corners of the city."

Marcus appeared in the doorway. He looked at first oat Callisto, later at her charges, laughing up his sleeve.

"I think that everything was already said, although looking at your faces, I'm guessing that it is hard for you to be reconciled with it. I wanted you to meet with the person who you will be protecting. I would like you to talk with Natalie. Perhaps thanks to that you'll become convinced that it is worthwhile making such an effort. But at first I wanted to grant you a few advices. I will start with you." He pointed at Hub.

"Your response time is incredible slow for a teleporter. Fox is a normal girl, knowing how to use weapon and electronics, she has no special abilities. You had a huge advantage over her. If you reacted correctly, you should neutralize her before her shot. As regards you..." this time he turned to Freakshow.

"For a shape-shifter, you have poor imagination. You should turn into something what could defeat the opponent with an ease. To change into the muscleman to the fight against the muscleman is a stupidity. I have nothing to say to telekinetic, you were afraid to use the enormousness of your powers, but in the real fight you would be unrivalled. You are the biggest riddle..." He came up to Wicked.

"So much energy and anger in you, but is there something apart from that?"

"There is..." The girl said. Her body flickered with an energy from which spectral silhouettes formed and after a few seconds returned back into her body.

"And one of them feels something towards you. Something very intense." She added.

"What are you talking about?" John was surprised.

"She is called Nicole and want to interact with you."

Eyes of the bearded man became large from an amazement. He went pale and moved away to a distance of few strides from the young woman. After a moment he tightened fists and his face expressed irritation.

"Are you demonstrating me your abilities this way? Are you a telepath? Is there no holiness for you?"

Wicked approached John.

"I'm not a telepath. My powers are psychic, but they are acting in the completely different way than it seems to you. My body works as the magnet for something what people leave behind after their death. Ghosts, souls, or something else becomes a part for me. All the time I feel the presence of many personalities in myself, I can sometimes hear their voices, thoughts, I'm feeling their emotions. The one of souls reacted intensively when you turned up at the room. She yelled with her whole being to me asking to let her see you, even if for a moment."

John wasn't convinced with explanations of black-haired mutant girl.

"Even if what you're saying is true, how can you know the ghost of Nicole? After all she died here and you come from the completely different dimension, from the completely different reality! She could not know you let alone to become a part of you!"

Wicked closed her eyes, she fell into a pensive mood, and then answered.

"I can also cause that personalities to materialize in the form of the apparition. Nicole asks me to do it. She wants you to believe me." She said calmly. The man felt unsteadily, he didn't know how to react. He wanted, with his whole being, things the girl said to turn out to be the true and at the same time he didn't want reopening old wounds.

"Well. Do it. But not here. Let us walk into my study." He said to the girl. She agreed and went after the man. John sat down behind the desk and asked the mutant to took the place on the old couch. Marcus looked back at windows covered with blinds, as if he was afraid that somebody would peep what was supposed to happen. He swept hair aside from the forehead and leaning hands on the desk, he looked straight into the eyes of the girl.

"Do it." He ordered. Wicked closed her eyes and her body surrounded itself with a blue glow. The aura started waving, reshaping, increasing its intensity. Simultaneously, human profiles and faces of women, men and children turned up at it. It looked out as if these figures swam in some immaterial stream. One of silhouettes separated itself from its companions, appeared by the girl and her shape became more and more recognizable. Soon she was transformed into the apparition of the woman with curly hair and big eyes.

"Nicole!" John shouted stretching the hand out towards the ghost. The apparition moved in his direction, tried to communicate with him, but some huge power drew her back into the interior of the mutant's body.

"Why you took her! Give her back to me!" The man rose with an anger. Wicked sighed.

"It was not me I. I haven't learnt how to control them. As a matter of fact it is the first effort calling somebody specific." She replied.

"But how it is possible? How did you get in touch with her? How did she unite with you?" John asked questions excited with what he saw a moment ago.

"After all she died here... I was there..." He added.

"Something terrible happened where I had lived. Tens of my friends died in the massacre and I survived. It turned out that somehow their consciousnesses, souls united with me and I could use their help. In the moment of passage through the wormole I lost contact with everyone, they were brutally torn from me, torn out from my body. You probably remember that I arrived here in very bad condition, I almost died. As it turned out, the shock of loss of the contact with ghosts had this kind of impact on me. When I was in your hospital, weakened and beaten, beings similar to my old companions gathered around my bed. Apparitions, ghosts or else waited for me to invite them to my body. When I agreed, they became a part for me. Your Nicole had to be among them, her ghost or the life energy. I'm not fully accustomed to them yet, I'm not able to ask them for favors like my earlier guests. Perhaps I need more practice."

"I'm sorry that I shouted at you. I thought that you wanted to cheat on me."

"It's all right. I still don't like your idea of our participation in your mission, but I know that I have no choice."

"You can go to your friends. Talk with Natalie. Please."

Wicked rose from the couch and headed for the door. She stopped halfway. She turned around looking at the man.

"Who she was for you, this Nicole?"

"Somebody very important. Ask her, if you want to know more. It was a wonderful woman."

The girl left the room leaving John alone with his own memories.

Erik Lehnsherr stood on the roof of the residential tower. There was a sunny day and the large metropolis seemed to be much more friendly than at the night. Huge buildings reflected the sunlight, causing that rays reached even the lowest levels of the city. The traffic of diverse vehicles going and flying was as big as at the night, some of them flew so close to man's head, that he could see drivers and passengers. The large tower rising over the city revealed details of its structure. This building was very dark, almost entirely black and the strange glow which surrounded it was almost invisible in rays of the sunshine. Its surface reminded the objects from H.R. Giger's images and it was an arrangement of very well designed strong muscles and hard bones covered additionally with the chitinous armor. The tower changed its volume rhythmically but very slowly, its oscillations reminded huge, black, breathing lungs. The transparent dome made of material blocking Erik's natural abilities was above his head. The mutant had more freedom than in his guest room, but he still could not leave it without the company of somebody from the security. Kanzar didn't trust him or didn't want Magneto to discover something what he should not see. The young girl with pointed ears turned up at the room. Erik observed her, realized that she was irritated and avoided looking at his face. He came to her, much closer than the last time.

"Lord Kanzar wants to see you." She said.

"And you still cannot talk to me? After all Kanzar said that I was his guest. Yesterday, he showed me the city and promised to search your world for my lost companions."

"I cannot talk. I cannot speak since Lord Kanzar orders it." The girl said.

"He isn't here. And I won't recall that you spoke to me. Who are you for Kanzar?" The man asked looking into the eyes of elven woman. She mutely turned her head away towards the door.

"How does he treat you? Everyone is a part of the Cosmic Awareness in your society and everyone is free. Kanzar told me about it. If it's true, why cannot you do what you want to do?"

"Let us walk, or else Lord Kanzar will become nervous. He is waiting for you." The girl clenched fists. She pointed mutely at the opened door, asking Erik to listen her and went to Kanzar. Magneto resigned from the conversation. He did what she had asked him. The man went along the corridor which was quite big, glassed from every side and full of the green plants planted in evenly arranged flowerpots. When the man was in the front of stairs going directly to the neighboring residential tower, made of white material intensively reflecting the sunlight, the girl stopped saying that Erik must go there alone. She turned around and went in the opposite direction so that he didn't have a time to ask her next question. After passing many steps, the man reached the large chamber full of the diverse flora climbing up the futurist looking furniture. Kanzar waited for him on the second end of the room, near electronic devices connected with organic elements wrapped around chairs and wandering in a few directions on the stone floor.

"Welcome traveler. " Long-haired man said smiling.

"Every place is breathtaking. Your city is more beautiful than everything I could see so far."

"It's only the tip of the iceberg. We created even more wonderful places than this city." Kanzar replied.

"Do you have some news about my companions?" Erik asked.

"Unfortunately. We didn't find where they are. This place is huge and rebels are hiding in the darkest corners to which nobody with right senses wants to drop in. However I have a proposal of action which fasten our search. Therefore I asked you to come to this place traveler." Kanzar made a gesture with hands, as if he wanted to grasp the entire room.

"We have problems with finding your companions, since we know nothing about them. If only we could read their appearance out from your memories, there would be no problem. Our minds interface and we are pass thoughts between each other with the speed of light."

"Is this some kind of computer center? A I supposed to create the facial composite of my team members?"

Kanzar came up to one of chairs wrapped up by organic wires and touched it with one hand.

"There is no need to waste time for drawing portraits, because we have a much faster way of getting them out of your memory."

"Yes?"

"The chamber in which we are is one of nervous centers of our Collective. Thanks to these devices you will be able to unite with the Creator of our community and with every intelligent being of our society. Our thoughts will become yours and your thoughts ours. The veil of mystery will fall down and all our secrets will be accessible to you. You will become a part of the whole, your life will gain the sense and we will become richer having your personality. You will be able to conduct a search on your own initiative, being in contact with everyone and with each of us, you will be able to ask about your friends. You need just sit down on this chair and we will deal with the rest. Don't be afraid."

Kanzar was waiting for the reaction of the man. Magneto hesitated what to do for a moment. The proposal of the long-haired man made sense, being a part of such a great society he could add all efforts and all measures to find mutants as soon as possible. He could ask the being ruling the Collective for the help in return to his own reality. However he didn't like the world from the very beginning, it was something unnatural in it. Additionally, the strange behavior of young girl, the fear in the most wonderful of possible worlds which he observed a few minutes before, caused that he had wanted to learn about her more. He quickly came to the only right decision.

"No. I won't become a part in your machine, you won't steal the right to make my own decisions and my future from me. I'll be searching for my companions, alone if necessary, I will find them and I'll find a way to get out of this place."

Kanzar became nervous. His fists tightened on the pulsing duct so firmly that some ruby red organic substances started dripping from it.

"Finding them was in your reach. It will be enough that you will sit down on this chair!"

"You said everyone in the Collective had the free will not limited by anything."

"It's true, ask anybody of us!"

"In that case I can decide what I want to do and I choose not to become its part." Erik announced very firmly.

"You will stay alone, you won't manage to live in this place." Kanzar tried to convince the man

"I don't intend." Magneto finished the conversation, surrounded his body with a cocoon of the energy and levitating, moved towards the exit from the room. Long-haired man stood amongst bushes, trees and creepers, amongst sculptures, electronics and pulsing organic structures, she was loser felt while Magneto emerge victorious from the First Tempting of the place, which was The Paradise for one people and fulfillment of the worst nightmares for others.


	6. Chapter 6

**Chapter 6. **

Kanzar entered the long, rectangular room lighted by spherical lamps hanging beneath the ceiling. There was a long table in the shape of an ellipse in the middle of the room and many diverse beings were sitting around him. Kanzar sat down in one of oval chairs leaning hands against the cold top of the lightly phosphorescing table.

"Did you manage to urge your prisoner to cooperate?" asked reptiloid covered with green scales in the white dress.

"Unfortunately no. As it turned out he probably suspects something. I will have to work with him longer."

"Perhaps we should deal with his conditioning?" reptiloid said looking at the long-haired man with eyes of the snake.

"There is no need to rise with an anger, comrade." Grey-skinned Zeta Reticuli with big dark eyes in the shape of almonds, dressed in long, red-golden robes, tried to calm him down.

"Proving the truth of the next thesis about the state of the Cosmic Awareness is the act worth the distinction. Kanzar deserves the recognition and the place by our table." He added. Insectoid with the appearance of a large green praying mantis joined the conversation. He made a few squawking, high sounds which immediately were translated by the computer in the wall.

"I agree with our comrade." The electronically sounding voice announced.

"Conclusion: one should remind us truths which we already established. Join the new truth to the database." The pale girl with black hair said. She was holding the cube with groups of cables going into her thick hair.

"The first thesis: the control of the "Savior" over the Cosmic Community becomes less with every new assimilated world on the Cosmic Ladder of the Creation."

"It's obvious. Otherwise we would not be able to freely meet and talk about these matters now." The man in the golden mask dressed in the bright suit said.

"Then why don't you want to give us your true identity away?" The lizard shouted banging his fist on the table.

" I don't have to excuse myself before kind which is worse intellectually than me!" The masked man answered.

"Let us immediately cease this unnecessary exchange of the malicious remark. We must be strong, if we want to proceed according to our plan. We must be the unity, comrades." The grey alien announced getting up off the chair and simultaneously spreading his hands out. Mantis-like insectoid squawked loud and the computer translated his words: "let us already proceed to the next thesis." The Black-haired girl sighed gripping the cube-shaped box.

"The second thesis: Power of the "Savior" decreases with every next consumed world." She said. This time nobody from the room spoke.

"The third thesis: Power of the "Saviour" comes from the previous worlds occupied by him."

"Nobody confirmed this." The reptile replied.

"Our scientists don't have doubts. It's the only way to rationally explain whom he is and how could he create all miracles which we could see." The older woman with short, grey hair announced .

"The rational vision of the world isn't real. In order to understand how the creator of the power of the Collective acts it is necessary to extend beyond the narrow framework of comprehension." The man in the golden mask joined in the conversation.

"Nobody of us tried to come back to houses of our ancestors, therefore we cannot be sure about it." The other woman spoke, the one with long black hair and dark eyes.

"My subordinates from the Science Institute confirm observation of disruptions in the space-time which agree with the theory of Ms Mahler. It can be the beginning of the slow process in which this reality will be destroyed and will renovate the energy of the sleeping savior." Kanzar added.

"I'm adding the new thesis. A person able to produce the stable gate to the reality not occupied by the Cosmic Collective turned up in our city. Conclusion: the journey to the other world is possible unaided by the power of the Being from Outside, also. called the Savior." The black-haired girl came back to the conversation.

"My plan would fail, if not our friends' sacrifice." Kanzar announced pointed at the person sitting by him. The figure dressed in the golden armor, decorated with diverse geometric patterns and with the head hidden in the helmet looking like the inverted bowl, got up from the chair and came to the long-haired man. A telepathic voice sounded in minds of all those present.

"My sacrifice and my brothers' is nothing compared with the possibility of stopping the march of the Collective through reality. We arrived here to correct the biggest mistake in all history of the Multiverse. Our mistake."

"Now everything depends on Kanzar and the man which Knights got to our city." The black-haired woman said.

"There is also mystery in the form of the child held in the camp of rebels and her extraordinary abilities." The alien started the new subject.

"Perhaps our companion in the armor has some theories about her?" The reptilian humanoid asked about.

"I don't know how such an anomaly could come into existence. It never happened before in the worlds occupied by the Collective. I have too little data in order to come to any conclusions."

"We should catch her and use against the sleeping Savior!" The reptile reacted explosively again. Insectoid squawked something which was translated to "I agree with our comrade."

"Such a radical step will attract the attention of him to us. Let us remember that still the bigger part of the world obeys him and it's under his control." Zeta Reticuli announced calmly signifying his predecessors to be not very sensible reasonable in the conversation.

"That's true, we cannot bring her to our city at the moment. The creator of the Collective had a very unpleasant contact with her and we know very well what order would be issued in the relation to her person. Therefore we tolerate the existence of the camp of rebels directly under our feet. Any attempt to attack the camp could lead to the escape of rebels from the ruins of old Tokyo and irretrievable loss of this girl." Kanzar answered.

"Exactly. And now we'll discuss another case. Why did soldiers directly under your command enter the area of the camp and did not returned from there? Wasn't this risky and unreasonable move?" The black-haired woman asked.

"I had no choice. Our guest didn't turn up at the anomaly alone. A group of people accompanied him, everyone with the powers. I had to order my people to follow them just because I didn't want to fall into disfavor to anybody faithful to the leader of the Cosmic Collective. He probably also noticed the space-time anomaly."

"Does it mean that there are other people coming from the world not occupied by the Collective in the city?" The man in the golden mask asked.

"Yes, but they're not important to our case." Kanzar replied.

"They got here by our mistake." The individual in the golden armor added telepathically.

"I will disagree with it." The grey, bald alien announced.

"Mechano-organic being held at the Institute of the Science is unusually interesting. I hope that I will have an access to results of the experiments conducted on it." He added.

"Of course. Dr. Mahler will make all reports of analyses available to you." Kanzar informed and the grey haired woman only nodded her head in a sign of the agreement.

"Our meeting lasts too long. It's about time to finish and come back to our own placec in the huge machine which our cosmic community is. " The man in the golden mask said simultaneously rising from his chair. Soon, other members of the clandestine congregation left the conference room: reptiloid, the black-haired girl and the older woman as well as insectoid and Zeta Reticuli. Only Kanzar, the woman with a long hair and the large man in the armor stayed in the room.

"You can return. I wouldn't like the Being from Beyond to sense a presence of somebody whom it could regard as a threat. Not now, when we're finally so close to our longed-for goal." Kanzar said.

"Of course. Another chance won't come up. I am the only Knight who remained alive on the Ladder of the Space Creation. All my brothers perished in the destroyed and not suitable for life Universes, too young or too old space-times, impossible to dwell in." The man in the armor announced started disappearing in the thin air. Soon, his armored form disappeared, teleporting into the unknown. Kanzar and the woman keeping him company went to the oval lift reacting automatically to the presence of persons inside the cabin.

"I don't know how you can bear the presence of reptiloid, insectoid and Zeta Reticuli in one room so calmly." The black-haired girl asked.

"They are useful allies. " The gray haired man replied coldly.

"Your people accustomed to the perfection and the beauty must call for help these mistakes of the evolution. Very mention of something like that causes that I hate our perfect community more and more."

"Almea, you're talking in my name but I can see very well that it is you who have problems with our inner circle." The long-haired soldier answered simultaneously smiling to the person standing by him.

"Every moment spent in this company causes that I want to undress and to run up to the disinfecting shower. I'm sitting next to a disgusting, green bug! And this little shrimp, his eyes are drilling into my soul! I'm feeling as if he is reading my thoughts any couple of minutes..."

"Perhaps he is doing this. Reticuli are well-known from their telepathy and he is a spiritual leader in their community. He probably has the highest rank in mind control abilities. He is strong enough that he could control every our decision with an ease. He isn't doing this probably only because a constant use of telepathy could lead to a new connection with the awareness the Cosmic Collective. We should be grateful to our savior." The lift reached its destination, one of the highest levels of the metropolis. In the distance one could see the wide platform full of city dwellers waiting for flying oval vehicles, stopping every couple of minutes, being a high-speed means of transport between residential towers. In spite of shielding and force fields, quite a strong, unpleasant wind blew there. Almea had corrected hair falling on her face every couple of minutes.

"My ship will arrive in a minute." She said.

"I think that we should meet again. Ina private, like in the old days." She added.

"I also don't belong to your race. Don't you feel disgust at the very thought about a closeness to me?" The man asked.

"In you I can see the being better than myself, the crown of the evolution. Object of desires and unfulfilled dreams. And those... they are animals given an intelligence by a mistake." The woman announced. She noticed the stopping air carrier and immediately moved to its side. Kanzar remained in his place for a moment, but as soon as the flying machine came off with passengers aboard, he rose into the air using his telekinesis and moved away from the landing platform.

A dawn broke and extremely important day came for every resident of the rebels' camp and defectors from the city established by aliens from other realities. Each of them was busy with preparations to leave the ruined part of the city aboard antigravity craft belonging at one time to the race called the chosen ones. People carried suitcases and boxes with the belongings of their entire life inside, pushed carts filled up to edges with various things found amongst ruins, stolen in lower parts of metropolis or obtained in fights against its guards. Some of them used helpers in the form of obsolete mobile robots or autonomous lorries, but the majority had to use the power of their own muscles. The team of young mutants from Genosha didn't avoid the work in preparations for the expedition. Freakshow, turned into the monster with four hands, helped to move heavy objects and his black friend teleported different objects closer the place of the rest of large flying machine so that their loading could be faster and simpler. Shola didn't help at works on account of too great instability of his telekinesis. Instead of it, he participated in the demolition of everything that could not be taken as well as could not fall into the hands of enemies. Wicked and Callisto did exactly the same as any other resident of the camp. The black-haired girl wasn't able to cause that her apparitions become material, therefore she had to use the help only and exclusively of her own muscles. Each member of the team got green-grey uniform which also was worn by John Marcus' people. One-eyed mutant was an exception. She didn't change her black clothes because she was not going to become a member of the expedition to the Ocean City. The woman planned the return to the city in order to find Magneto and Karima Shapandar. Everyone headed towards areas behind the camp, to the port in which there was already no ships and all buildings turned into the ruin. The force field surrounding the hiding place of outcasts from the community of the Collective had its last generators there and beyond there was only an open sea separating the island from the distant continent. Large transport vehicle, being the only way to get out of the town, floated in one of docks. Its anti-gravity drive was turned on, but the vehicle kept the low altitude on account of the energy saving and its lower part was immersed in the water. The airship was three levels high and its cubical shape with the streamlined bow resembled some huge submarine. Three entries to its deck were open and wooden ramps, through which residents of the camp could carry the most needed things, were connected to them. Hub teleported big box straight before one of the ramps. She was worn out very much and had to have a break. She sat down on the pavement leaning her back against the wooden board. She was looking at moving people, feeling coming sleepiness. The black-haired girl, who earlier hurt her with the shot of the stun handgun, came to her at the same moment.

"Hub? Is this the way they call you?" She asked. The black woman looked at her unwillingly and after a moment she turned away her head.

"You should not overexert yourself. You were wounded and the strength of the stun handgun is great enough to fell down even reptiloid." The woman started the conversation.

"You came here to boast about your victory? I'm worn out and I don't feel like listening to you." Hub replied. Black-haired girl approached her and crouched down close enough to see the face of the girl.

"You misunderstood me. I came here, because I want to apology to you. I misjudged you, we all misjudged you." She announced.

"Apology? Recently, you wanted to kill me. You were ready for this and Callisto's injured arm is a proof."

"Yes, that's true. I thought that you were somebody completely different. You can't even imagine what happened to me after the chosen ones decided to occupy this city. What I went through... anger accumulated in me for these all years until found its release at last. But in the wrong moment and directed at the wrong person... and I want to apologize to you... if..."

"Well. I heard what you wanted to say! But now better clear off and help in moving things from the camp to this ship! We have no time. I'll also come back to the work as soon as I rest." Hub said coldly implying clearly that she didn't feel like making friends with the girl. At the same time, Wicked was stopped by the blonde with whom she earlier had fought in the middle of the campsite.

"Stop!" The blonde shouted. Mutant girl ignored her taunts. She quickened the pace in order to be closer to the procession of people going to the port. The girl stopped her, throwing the packet off her hands.

"What are you doing, for Christ's sake!" Wicked was very angry.

"Maybe we should finish what we've started!" The blonde said. Wicked clenched fists.

"You're really nuts! I'm helping you even though I really don't like it, but you start all over again! After all you know who I am, I'm not from that city! What do you have against me now?"

"I don't like that Marcus treats you like some celebrities. I only want to show you where your place is: in the mud, close to the earth." The blonde said and her every gesture expressed the great dislike for the girl from the other reality. Mutant tried to do everything in order not to let herself be provoked by her. She picked the packet up from the pavement and moved ahead. The woman with short hair barred her way again.

"I don't know what you did to Marcus, but you won't cheat me. I still don't know what you're doing here, but it's certainly not something good. I will unmask you."

"Girl, I didn't ask to come in this camp or to this world! I'm helping you only because thanks to that I'll be able to get back home! Keep away from me and don't provoke me anymore. We have no time for such bollocks!"

"We will meet again. And then I won't be refraining myself." The blonde turned away from Wicked taking the knife out. Mutant girl summoned three wraithlike figures. She smiled victoriously.

"I won't be refraining myself also." She announced.

Shola Inkosi was using his telekinetic powers in order to demolish buildings abandoned by the rebels leaving the area. All objects being destroyed by him were empty, therefore the boy didn't need to suppress the power of his hits. The old campsite was disappearing in a very rapid pace so only clouds of dust and ruins remained. The old, grey haired woman, in whose house the young mutants had stayed before, was looking at all the destruction with tears in her eyes. When Shola stopped his actions in order to rest for a moment, the woman came up to him slowly.

"Thank you for your help." He said.

"I cannot watch the place in which I lived so many years is turning into the rubble." She added after a moment.

"Aren't you happy that you will finally be able to live somewhere, where it is safe?" The black man asked.

"I'm happy. I'm happy for Natalie and other young people who remember nothing apart from that dirty campsite, where they didn't have a real childhood and instead of looking at the bright Sun during days and beautiful stars at nights, they looked at walls of that cursed metropolis casting an eternal shadow to our houses. They full of hope waiting for what is waiting for them behind force field surrounding the city, but I am already old enough to not share their enthusiasm. Here, amongst all this rubbish, we didn't have a luxury, but at least we had our small country, semblance of freedom. But the place to which we're going exists only in our stories and dreams.

"Do you think that the Ocean City doesn't exist? Do you think that it is only a legend?"

"The city probably exists... but I have a feeling that it is the same as the one behind these cursed walls."

The woman answered looking at the wall above the camp, behind which foundations of the large metropolis were hidden. She smiled.

"I'm not going to bore you anymore. You have so much work to do. Don't listen to the old woman and think about how to find the way home. I must take care of Natalie. She will need me all the time." She announced coming off towards the port.

Meanwhile Callisto, Marcus and the woman keeping him company talked near the vacated building recently housing the command center of rebels.

"We're setting off in an hour. You can still change your mind and come with us to look for the Ocean City. Your group should not without the leader." The man suggested.

"It isn't. Shola is suitable for this task. When I'm not around, he will have to make his own decisions not looking at my approval. I must come back up." The mutant woman answered.

"I must find Magneto and Karima and return to my reality with them." She added.

"It's your decision. Remember that it won't be easy."

"I didn't think that it would be."

"Callisto, when you are ready for the expedition I will show you the place in which you can go through the wall and get to the internal part of the city, where foundations of all the towers are located. I want you to take Xiriel with you." The bearded man introduced the woman with the pale complexion, blue eyes and hair covered by the blue fabric, standing by him.

"She is one of few people knowing the way through the maze which foundations of the city are. Her help will certainly be useful to you, besides when two people perform some task it is much probable that at least one of them will make it until the end."

"Well. If she is able to keep up with me." The one-eyed woman replied. Xiriel looked at her with stern look.

"We can race going up, if this is your wish." She said.

"I hope that you will reach an agreement quickly. You both have some important business to do up there and without the cooperation your journey will end very quickly."

"I didn't intend to hurt nobody. It is my sense of humor." The one-eyed woman announced.

"I understand benefits of the cooperation." The pale girl replied.

Meanwhile Charles Xavier, Amelia Voght, Book and Carmella Unscione found by them were in the hospital in which the ginger woman had worked. The professor waited in one of small rooms which was probably a rest place for doctors and nurses. He was there entirely alone, however Amelia joined him soon. She looked at the man suspiciously, but it was he who first started the conversation.

"How is she feeling?" He asked.

"She's sleeping. She was poisoned with something and it weakened her organism very much. But she is safe now. We'd rather be afraid of our lives, when she regains consciousness."

"Good. We can start the search for the next members of your team. Right away I will notify Book and together we will find Kleinstocks."

"Charles. I'll move nowhere until you explain something to me."

"Yes?" The bald man was surprised by his friend's answer and behavior.

"All that's happened here since we came back with ill Carmella... that's too strange to be only a coincidence. Doctors asked me no questions concerning Carmella's identity, carried all my orders out obediently... they agreed without the moment of a thought so that Unscione stayed in a room for VIPs. And now this... you're sitting in the doctor's room although you're only a guest and nobody asked why. What's more nobody has looked here since you appeared. What is going on Charles?"

The professor was silent looking at the wall covered with white wallpapers.

"I provided discretion necessary for us." He replied after a moment.

"Does it mean that you control all these people? Just like this?"

Xavier again was silent not wanting to answer questions of the woman.

"Charles, tell me at least how many are under your control. Please."

"Everyone who enters this floor." Xavier announced very unwillingly, turning his head away towards the window.

"The entire floor? Do you realize what it means? Don't you notice that you behave precisely the same as he?"

"The time is critical for us. We cannot permit ourselves the mistake if we want to get my students back to this reality. What I did was the quickest solution."

"But completely not fitting in your philosophy! To control the people as some machines only to help you serve some purpose? You behave precisely like Magneto!"

"The life of my pupils is threatened. I will do everything to help them and get them here."

"He explained all atrocities which he did, exactly in the same way."

"When you followed his path, somehow it didn't disturb you then."

"Charles... I don't feel like dwelling on the past now. I won't be disturbing you in what you are planning, but before you do the next step remind yourself what such a thinking and actions did to him."

"Amelia, be ready for the transport of you and me to the place where Kleinstocks are as soon as Book and me learn where they are." Professor Xavier finished the conversation changing the subject entirely. He didn't intend to discuss the moral aspect of his plans with the woman belonging at one time to the group of the people fanatically devoted to Magneto's ideology.

"Please yourself... now I can see very well why you didn't want to involve your X-Men. They would stop you Charles. At all costs." The woman went out of the room, leaving the man alone with his thoughts.

An evening came and all work associated with the loading of things belonging to residents of the camp to the deck of the flying machine, gearing up for the start in one of port's docks of the devastated city, had come to an end. All young mutants rested near the burning bonfire and Callisto also joined them. The woman knew that soon she had been supposed to part with her group and could not protect them farther. She was worried about their future, but she knew that she could not take any of them with her. The city behind the walls was too dangerous to strangers from the other world, although visiting it was necessary.

"Marcus is already on the board of the ship. In a minute, you will be taking off." She said looking at lightings gleaming on the hull of the gigantic machine.

"I don't have much time also... she is so impatient." She added pointing at Xiriel standing in the ruins in the darkness.

"Are you sure that you don't want to go there with somebody of us?" Shola asked.

"We talked about it and I think that I could get there much faster. Since I teleported ourselves up-down, what is the problem in doing it in a reverse order?" Hub added.

"It's too dangerous. It was the only solution then, but now I won't let you risk the materialization into some buildings or rocks."

"Magneto and Karima are up there... we also want to help them." Freakshow said.

"Exactly. We are X-Men, right? Why are we escaping from threats? Why are we supposed to help strangers instead of our group's members?" Wicked asked.

"I know that you're brave enough to go with me and you must not prove it. But up there, I'll need to act in a secret and abilities of the majority of you aren't the quietest ones. And apart from that I promised Xavier to protect you and not to expose you to the death. There will be a hundred of other people shipboard with you and I'm sure that your travel won't be a pleasure trip! I'm sure that you will be able to demonstrate your heroism. And now go or else they'll leave without you if you don't hurry up!"

For a moment mutants didn't say a word, not being able to accept the decision of their leader. However they understood that they wouldn't change her decision.

"Take care of yourself." Freakshow said.

"Get them back." Hub added. Shola and Wicked said goodbye to Callisto mutely, simultaneously coming off towards the port, where ultimate preparations for raising the aircraft from the sea surface were taking place. Xiriel approached the one-eyed woman.

"Are you ready?" She asked. Callisto didn't answer her for a moment looking at friends walking away. At last, she moved the opposite way.

"I am. Show me where this entry is." She replied coldly. Both woman came off in the place pointed by pale skinned friend of John Marcus. After passing the ruins of the camp and the square on which scraps not suitable for taking to the deck of aircraft were stored, they reached the metal wall blocked by wooden boxes and barrels.

"It's here." Xiriel said. After a moment of thought, she came up to one of barrels with the intention of moving it to some other place.

"What are you waiting for? Help me to remove all that's blocking the entry!" She added after a moment. Black-haired mutant woman complied with her request and also started removing obstacles standing before the entry to the internal part of the city. When women finished their work, a steel padlocked door appeared in the front of their eyes. Xiriel took the key out of the pocket showing it to Callisto.

"Behind this door there's force field protecting our camp. When we go through the gate, we will be on our own, nobody who could help us will be there. I hope that you know what you decided on." She announced.

"I have no clue. But I also have no choice. People of my team are up there."

"I admire your loyalty. The first phase of our journey will be the most difficult for us. Behind the door there are the same ruins as the ones in which our camp was located, but additionally there are foundations of the large city. I'm not thinking about some simple construction with one corridor and the path leading up, but rather about the true maze to which no maps exist. This place is dark and unfriendly to everyone who is travelling through it. Its architecture alone seems to be created only to confuse its guests, to imprison him in its interior forever, to cause that he never finds the destination of his travel. I'm talking about the doors that go into the chasm, stairs going nowhere and the omnipresent wind whispering something incomprehensible and horrifying both by days and at nights."

"New York's underground city was not a nice place too. And I was brought up there." Callisto replied.

"It's not all. The undergrounds aren't empty. They are inhabited not only by ghosts of old residents. People live there, too crazy to stay with us in the camp, the ones which headed there of their own free will and the ones which were exiled there by Marcus for different felonies. But the fact that this place is a dustbin of the metropolis is the worst. I don't mean ordinary waste which the large city produces, although places of their recycling are also there and perhaps they will be the only way to upper decks, but rather I mean living waste. Victims of failed experiments of madmen from the Institute of the Science. These deformed monstrosities are full of hate of everyone who they meet." Callisto heard the talk of the woman out until the end and then she spoke.

"Xiriel, if it is so terribly there why you decided to go me? I cannot understand it. I must go there, because my friends are there, but you? Your place should be by the side of rebels. Didn't you want to move to the Ocean City with them?"

"I'm not one of them. I was there only because Marcus took care of me. Actually I'm involved with the ones who live up there..."

"Then why you claim that we'll find nobody who could help us there?" Callisto was surprised at the reply of the woman. Xiriel took the scarf off revealing her long, white hair and pointed ears.

"I was born as one of the Chosen Ones, but I'm not welcome among them now. An award for my head was fixed up there. It probably happened. He's able to do it. In spite of this, I must come back up, because I have somebody whom I care about up there and with whom I would like to settle the certain very old business."

"Ok. In that case, we must go there." Callisto announced thinking that Xiriel's presence could bring her some trouble about.

In the same time, the large airship housed all rebels as well as the group of young mutants from other world on its deck. Its engines were ready and the anti-gravity drive lifted it much higher than before, so high that none of its surfaces had touched water from the bay. John Marcus sat on the armchair in the control room of the ship and the employees closest to him tested the performance of all deck computers. The man turned to one of women sitting behind the steering panel.

"Do we have a possibility of the tie-up with the loudspeaker system in the entire ship?" He asked.

"We aren't sure with which ones, but we have access to the majority of decks." The girl replied.

"Well. I have an important message to tell."

"Please speak. The communication was opened." The woman answered. Marcus started his speech.

"My friends. A new day starts for us today, a day which we waited for many years, a day in which coming many of us didn't believe. Today we are leaving the cursed place in which we had to live and we are setting off for the search for our promised land. Today we start our journey to the Ocean City, the place in which each of us will be able to live in a peace, not being afraid that soldiers of the Collective will barge into our houses in the least expected moment. Our travel will be difficult, full of threats, because people from the city above us will want to destroy us, only to get Natalie. We must expect that we will be attacked already in the first part of our journey. We should not be afraid, because we have unusual friends with us, all with abilities equal to the Chosen Ones'. Let us remember to assist them in an hour of the greatest need. I wish you all safe journey to the Ocean City. Natalie is the most important for us You must protect her at all costs, because only she is able to wipe off the evil which destroyed our planet."

All rebels listened to their leader with lesser or greater attention, also Excalibur group members, gathered in one room and also small Natalie under the care of Mary. Each of them had a hope in the place to which they were supposed to coma after the journey and at the same time, each of them was afraid of what had waited outside the force field protecting the city. The large machine went up higher and then moved towards the sea. Force field protecting it had a frequency perfectly matching the field surrounding the bay, therefore the machine underwent through it without any problem as if it was an ordinary fog afloat above the abandoned port.

Meanwhile, Kanzar resting in his study was alerted by one of his people.

"Lord Kanzar! One of our battle ships left city limits in the surroundings of the old port."

"Were some maneuvers anticipated?" The surprised man asked.

"No. I know nothing about it." The soldier replied.

"Did you check the energy signature of the machine?"

"No."

"Then what are you waiting for?"

The irritated soldier was silent for a moment and then announced:

"We entered the data into the cluster of computers. We will shortly receive the result."

After a little waiting time, the man spoke with a shaken voice.

"We have it. But it's impossible... it's a number of the vehicle which we lost during the war with rebels. Is it..."

Kanzar excluded the connection with the soldier. He rose from the armchair, simultaneously going to a window.

"It's obvious, you idiot." He thought.

"Rebels." He said aloud and then came back to the desk. He started a few video connections.

"Branch 12. An activity of rebels was discovered within the city limits. I am repeating, an activity of rebels was discovered within the city limits. Detailed information about their position is in a computer cluster in the message about unauthorized starting of the battle ship nearby the barrier of the city. Branch AS-2, activity of rebels was discovered within the city limits. Details in the announcement for Branch 12."

In the same time, in one of large white tower blocks, the alarm rang out from loudspeakers and words of Kanzar announcement was heard everywhere. Soldiers dressed in grey uniforms were distracted from their daily routine and forced to appear at the hangar where their vehicles waited for them. The huge space was filled by scooters, slender planes with a gleaming surface and a few bigger cargo ships. Soon, all vehicles left the tower like the swarm of metal insects. In other place a creaking sound sounded from loudspeakers. Crowds of insectoids listened closely to it in order to quickly to go deep into their nest. One after the other they entered interiors of their green, organic transport vehicles and their commander gave orders with language full of grinding and cracking.

Kanzar started the last connection, this time the private one, not belonging to the military line.

"Almea, rebels are leaving the town. Get in touch with trusted people from the surroundings of the old city's port and send them in place which coordinates I will send to you. You must catch that girl alive. And be careful, because more strangers with abilities can be there." He said breaking the connection with the familiar woman.


End file.
